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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28005951">To Befriend the Not-So-Legendary Son of Sparda</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/peoplearecoolbutimepic/pseuds/peoplearecoolbutimepic'>peoplearecoolbutimepic</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Devil May Cry</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Awkward Vergil, Can't Have Shit in Red Grave, Fluff, Gen, POV First Person, Slice of Life</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 20:01:31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>54,232</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28005951</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/peoplearecoolbutimepic/pseuds/peoplearecoolbutimepic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Moving to Red Grave was a weird decision. I can't tell what's stranger, though- the rampent demon attacks happening down the block, or the weirdo who always shows up to fix it.</p><p>Or, a bunch of loosely connected meetings with Vergil.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Vergil (Devil May Cry) &amp; Reader, Vergil (Devil May Cry)/Reader</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>177</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>458</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Just a Normal Day in the Fast Food Industry</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is the first time I've written a fanfic. Wrote 'em cause I was feeling crappy, figured I'd share them here- hopefully someone'll get a kick out of it.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s been a slow day.</p><p>That’s weird, even for a Tuesday. The drive-thru’s been blowing up since the front shut down. Usually people start pouring in- er, around- at four. It’s five-thirty and no one’s shown up for a while, now.</p><p>Of course they had to have me hand out today. I’ve already stocked and restocked everything in my station thrice over. Even the guy on dishes is getting antsy- they already let Nell and Adum leave. I have to stay, of course, since the world hates me-</p><p>Ah. We got an order. And a big one, at that.</p><p>Whoever ordered this either has a big family or is throwing a bat mitzvah, because they easily ordered a hundred dollars worth of food. Who orders seven Sprites, anyway?</p><p>With all the drinks capped, all I can do is wait. Might as well grab more sweet and sour sauce after this-</p><p>Wow. What a get-up.</p><p>So the guy just pulled up to the window. He looks like he just came out of a live action anime adaptation- who wears a trenchcoat in the middle of June?</p><p>Eh, weirder people’ve come through. As long as he doesn’t throw his coffee back at me (still not over that, asshole) then I couldn’t care less.</p><p>“We’re waiting for your food right now. It might be a while.” I go to hand him his drinks, then pause. He’s on a motorcycle… a weirdly pointy one, at that. I’m not even gonna question the eyes and the horns sticking out of the sides. “How are you, uh, planning on carrying all this?”</p><p>He gives me a weird look. I can’t tell if he’s tired or irritated.</p><p>“... whatever, man.” Fine, I didn't need an answer anyway. You’d expect someone on a motorcycle to be wearing a helmet, but not this guy. No wonder his hair’s so slicked back; he’s got the wind blowing through it twenty-four seven. He’s probably compensating for something.</p><p>His eyes squint. “What are you looking at?”</p><p>“Your jacket. It’s pretty cool,” I start, not really caring about formalities at this point. The food’s gonna be at least a few more minutes, so I might as well pass the time. “Where'd ya-”</p><p>Then the manager’s car explodes in the parking lot. Oh. Demons.</p><p>Well at least something’s happening.</p><p>He sighs. “Give me one moment,” he says, pulling into the nearest non-blown up parking spot. Then- from out of nowhere- he pulls out a katana. Just… a whole katana. He just had that somewhere, I guess.</p><p>Some maniacs take this as the perfect opportunity to come into the drive-thru. So, while this middle aged white haired guy kills demons in the parking lot, I continue handing out food as normal.</p><p>A rather daring bug-looking thing runs up to my window. I panic for a second before picking up the medium coffee I have lined up and chucking it full force. It starts screeching and scuttles away. Well, I guess that asshole was good for something.</p><p>Eventually, the rest of the demons get the memo and flee. People stopped coming into the drive-thru a couple minutes ago, so they must’ve gotten it too. Without saying anything, I awkwardly grab all his food and walk outside. Guess this is a curbside order now, eh?… okay that was a bad one.</p><p>“Your food’s done.”</p><p>He looks up from his sword and stares at me weirdly. He looks like he’s got something to say- probably something snarky, that bastard- but stays quiet.</p><p>Then, as he goes back to the motorcycle, a blue spectral ghost thing appears and grabs the food. I… don’t even know what to say about that one. For some reason, even though it doesn’t look remotely human, it looks slightly happier than that guy.</p><p>From the bike, he lifts his katana and slices a cross in the air. Before I can blink, the fabric of reality itself seems to split and a portal opens. He drives off, ghost and food in tow, and the portal closes behind him.</p><p>…</p><p>“I don’t get paid enough for this.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Small Talk While Bagging Pizzas</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's the guy again. Just how small is Redgrave, anyway?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>As promised, I'm posting another chapter tonight. Y'know, as a treat.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Another boring week.</p><p>Well, that’s not exactly right- it’s been six days since the parking lot incident, so of course nothing could be as interesting. Still, though, I’d take another random demon attack than this monotony. Being stuck in the jaws of capitalism is probably the same as the jaws of a demon. Regardless, I gotta check out people’s groceries. Of course I need two jobs; gotta pay the bills somehow.</p><p>Moving to Red Grave seemed like a good idea on paper- sure, the whole devil tower and the tree feeding on human blood seems like a turn-off, but the tax rate here is crazy low. Guess that’ll happen when all your neighbors are eaten by demons.</p><p>Oh boy, someone’s coming to my lane. No more spending time in my head.</p><p>Jeez, this guy’s got a mountain of food in his cart. If it weren’t for the fact that he’s freakishly tall, I don’t think he’d be able to see without leaning over the side…</p><p>Wait a second.</p><p>“Hey, you’re the guy from the parking lot.” I wasn’t expecting to see this dude again anytime soon. Though I bet I could pick him out in a crowd easily- kinda hard to miss the hair.</p><p>He glances up at me for a second, then goes back to putting his stuff on the belt. It’s then that I notice he’s wearing fingerless gloves. As if the fit wasn’t extra enough...</p><p>“You always in that get-up?” As if his eyebrows couldn’t crease further together. Now his irritation is palpable. “No wait, let me guess- your jacket’s made of demons.”</p><p>He doesn’t say anything. I swear that was supposed to be a joke, now I have to consider that as a real possibility. So would skinning a demon give you leather?</p><p>“You realize you’re speaking to a potential threat, yes?” He still doesn’t look up from what he’s doing- honestly I wasn’t even expecting a response.</p><p>“Poking a beast with a stick beats sitting here bored all day,” I respond. That’s only half right, though- really I’m too tired to care right now. “And a little casual wear couldn’t hurt, is all I’m saying.”</p><p>I’ve been subconsciously scanning barcodes, so I don’t realize until now just how many pizzas this guy has lined up. “Yeesh, whoever you’re buying for must really like Italian food. You got kids or something?”</p><p>He cracks a smirk. “Oh, he’s a child alright- just not in the way you’re thinking.”</p><p>“So he’s your brother, then.”</p><p>He starts a bit at that, then gives me a look. “How would you know?”</p><p>I can’t help but sigh a bit wistfully at that. “It’s just a way siblings talk about each other. It’s hard to explain, but you just kinda know.” That and it was a lucky guess, but he doesn’t need to know that.</p><p>Finally, I’m done scanning everything. “You paying with cash or credit?” He wordlessly pulls a credit card out of his wallet and gives it a swipe.</p><p>beep beep</p><p>“... your card’s being declined.” Seems all I’m good for is stating the obvious.</p><p>He tsks. “Of course he gives me a card that doesn’t work,” he grumbles, pulling out his wallet. I can’t help but notice the picture he has sticking to the side- a short haired, smiling man who looks suspiciously similar to him.</p><p>“That your brother?”</p><p>He looks up from his money for a second, then his eyes shift to the side. Is he embarrassed about something?</p><p>“He’s my son,” he states simply, clearly a little flustered, then continues counting. Ah, seems like a touchy subject.</p><p>He extends his hand to me with what looks like the exact amount. “Here.”</p><p>I take the money and count through. Sure enough, it’s perfect down to the dime. I put it in the register as a thought crosses my mind. “You’re not gonna have that weird ghost thing carry all your stuff again, are you?”</p><p>He doesn’t say anything at that, so I continue. “And try not to open portals in the middle of the lot, alright? Might scare off all the old ladies.”</p><p>“As if I would do such a thing in broad daylight,” he scoffs. I probably shouldn’t question his logic, but…</p><p>“You did that the other day, though. And you knew that at least I was watching.”</p><p>He pauses for a moment. “You seem as if you value your life enough not to tell others.”</p><p>“You’d be surprised,” I reply instinctively. Ah, my self depreciation humor is probably lost on this guy. He looks at me with what could almost be mistaken as pity. Though knowing this guy, it’s probably closer to disgust.</p><p>With that, he takes his leave, the flaps of his jacket flowing behind him as he walks. He sticks out like a sore thumb. Hope that guy’s fashion sense improves next time we meet.</p><p>If we meet again, that is.</p><p>That probably won’t happen.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Ah yes, the minimum wage saga continues. I wonder who those pizzas are for.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Store Encounters</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Self check-out machines are hard, okay? Cut him some slack.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm a sucker for Boomer-gil, if you couldn't tell.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It happens.</p><p>Seems he likes to get his shopping done around twice a week. Whatever he does for a living, it doesn’t give him a strict schedule- seems like he can show up whenever he pleases. Not like I’m complaining, though.</p><p>One time, on a particularly slow day, I saw him attempt to use the self check-out aisle. I was a little surprised he hadn’t tried that yet, what with the whole ‘not being a people’s person’ thing he’s got going on.</p><p>I figured out pretty quickly why he didn’t use them before.</p><p>He stood there, strawberries in hand, looking intensely at the barcode scanner. His eyes trailed from the scanner to the instructional poster hanging on the wall. He just kept flipping it in his hands, clearly confused. He was getting antsy.</p><p>Doing a onceover to make sure no one was around, I stepped out of my station and walked over to him. He noticed me and frantically kept trying to figure out how to use it. It was sad to watch, honestly.</p><p>“You need help?” I asked, leaning against the wall.</p><p>He looked at the snack section and said no.</p><p>I sighed. “Dude, there’s barely anyone here. No one’s gonna think it’s weird if you need help, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”</p><p>He shifted on his feet for a second and cleared his throat. “I’ve never encountered a machine like this, is all. I’ll figure it out.” He clearly wouldn’t.</p><p>“You’ve been at it for a while, now. Just let me walk you through it or you’re gonna be here all day.”</p><p>Before he could turn me down again, I began explaining the process, starting with the “begin order” option on the screen. He seemed to be coming to grips with the concept of a touchscreen. He got stuck at multiple points- some items had weirdly placed barcodes, he would accidentally scan things multiple times- and it seemed like a fruitless effort.</p><p>It took us around nine minutes, but we got the job done. He looked drained.</p><p>“Next time just come to a lane, capiche?” For once, he didn’t argue.</p><p>Another time, he ordered six sticks of butter. I asked what they were for, to which a vague “My brother and his friend are both idiots” was the only response I got. I was both curious and terrified to know more.</p><p>Today, though, he comes up to the counter with a sourpuss look on his face. Clearly something’s bothering him.</p><p>“Yikes, Hell must’ve frozen over if you’re this upset- wanna tell me what’s wrong?” I ask while scanning a carton of milk.</p><p>He bristles. “It’s none of your concern.”</p><p>As vague as that is, I can still guess the issue. “It’s your brother, isn’t it?”</p><p>Bull’s eye. His brows lower as he lets out a hearty sigh. “I don’t understand him, sometimes.”</p><p>“Yeah, I feel that,” I say, still focusing on scanning everything. “And talking about it afterwards can be a hassle. Really talking in general is hard.”</p><p>He hums, so I guess he agrees. I can’t think of much to say, so we stay quiet for a bit. Eventually, though, an interesting item comes up on the belt.</p><p>“This scarf for you?” I ask while holding it up. He only shrugs in response.</p><p>Really, it’s nothing special- just a dark blue-grey woolie little thing. Still, my curiosity is piqued. Is he actually taking my advice?</p><p>Before I can dwell on the thought, I scan it and he goes on his merry way. Or I guess on his decent way.</p><p>What a weirdo.</p><p>An interesting weirdo, but a weirdo nonetheless.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Gonna post this one then go to sleep. It's been a long couple of weeks. Night fellas, hope you're doing well.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. A Walk in the Park</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Vergil doesn't have good luck with trees.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>And here's another one. Hope I'm balancing the absurd demon situations with the average everyday life stuff.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I decided to take a walk, today.</p><p>It’s been a while since I’ve seen the sun. Whenever I get days off, I spend the day goofing off in my dinky little house. But the weather’s nice, especially for mid October, and I wanna get out before winter rolls around. I wasn’t really planning on going anywhere special- just a nice, calm walk through the park.</p><p>So color me surprised when someone smashes into a tree in front of me.</p><p>Yup, turns out if I would’ve turned a little to the left, I woulda witnessed a small scale demon invasion. I can’t have a normal month, can I? Well whatever’s happening seems to be going on a fair distance away, so I don’t really approach or run away. Might as well watch- I’ve got nothing better to do.</p><p>That guy, though. Seems like that tree’s got them pretty good. Sure, they seem pretty alive, but they got impaled right through the abdomen. Looks like they’re trying to shimmy out-</p><p>Oh. It’s him, again.</p><p>“Hey there,” I shout from a distance. His head whips around to look at me and I freeze. Maybe I shouldn’t be distracting him… I mean he’s still stuck there, y’know. But I can’t just leave now, I gotta say something.</p><p>Now of all the moronic things I could say next, this might be the worst: “You need a hand?”</p><p>What am I supposed to do about this???</p><p>I can tell he’s thinking the same thing- baffled doesn’t even describe the look he’s giving me right now. It’s like I’ve got three heads or something. Clearly I don’t, though, cause then I’d at least have one brain up here.</p><p>I shouldn’t even try- it’s a suicide mission. But on the other hand… </p><p>I look at the demons. Then I look at him. Then back at the demons. I mean they’re still pretty far away, so it should probably be fine. Probably.</p><p>Maybe.</p><p>So I start walking up to him. Well it’s less of a walk and more of a shuffle- it’s wonky and a little too fast to be normal. In my defense, I’ve never had to pull someone out of a tree branch, so pardon me if I seem a little frazzled.</p><p>As I get closer, I realize why I didn’t recognize him at first- the outfit. I guess he ditched the whole anime villain fit for a while, cause now he looks like he’s straight out of an old detective film. What with the lighter grey trench coat and the little scarf, all he needs is a fedora and a monocle.</p><p>Well at least his clothes aren’t made of demons anymore.</p><p>I reach the tree, then stop to think. Sure, I could just yank him by the foot and hope for the best, but will that do more harm than good? How much damage can this guy take?</p><p>Well judging by the look on his face, it clearly stings a little. But he’s still alive, right? If he can survive getting impaled, he’ll probably survive from being unimpaled. But how to do that…</p><p>Wait a minute, I’m stupid. “Hey, you still have that sword thing, yeah?”</p><p>He quirks a brow at me, then draws his blade. Bingo.</p><p>“Can’t you just, like, cut the branch off?” Ah, but his elbow is bent at a weird angle. “Yeah yeah just- just summon the one guy and give him the sword, he can- yeah that guy.” During my explanation, the blue ghost thing appears on his opposite side. Looks like he’s got his own version of the katana, so that shouldn’t even be an issue.</p><p>In one fell swoop, the front of the branch is cut clean off. He’s able to push himself most of the way out, though I give his boot a little tug to make sure. Then he’s out.</p><p>And he’s standing.</p><p>… </p><p>What’s this guy made of?</p><p>How can anyone go from being helplessly stuck and stabbed to just… standing? As if there isn’t a giant hole in their midsection?</p><p>I have no idea how to respond to that, so I- the intellect that I am- ask another stupid question. “You, uh… you good?”</p><p>Of course he’s fine. He’s standing, for Pete’s sake. Who just stands up after being impaled like that? Then again, not many people are able to materialize a human sized ghost monster, either.</p><p>Still though, he takes a breather. He stretches a little as he stands, and a sickening crack noise comes from his spine. Gross.</p><p>And he’s off, shish kabobing just about everything in sight. And, as I learn, he can summon more than just the blue guy- a bunch of tiny blue swords spawn in the air, shooting out like bullets at everything in sight.</p><p>What a weirdo.</p><p>Eh, I’ll just let him do his thing. It’s still light outside, yeah? Might as well finish my walk.</p><p>I’ll just follow the path as planned. He’ll finish up eventually. The likelihood of him getting stuck on a tree again is pretty low, so I’m not worried.</p><p>So on I go.</p><p>I loop back around twenty-ish minutes later and find him cleaning off the sword. Wow, he works fast. There isn’t a freakishly large insect in sight.</p><p>“You gonna do anything about the tree?” I motion to the plant turned modern art piece he was previously stuck on. There’s no way he just leaves it here, right?</p><p>Yet again, my expectations are too low. He unsheathes the sword and slices multiple times, faster than I can even hope to comprehend. He’s barely even moving, how could he cut something that far away? Before I can even think, the tree turns to nothing but ashes and a stump.</p><p>“... well, guess that counts as dealing with it.” Really, I shouldn’t be surprised. “Kinda lucky you were out here. I prolly woulda been turned into human stew by now, haha.”</p><p>He looks at me weirdly, then. It’s like he’s considering something. </p><p>Eventually, he reaches into his pocket and shuffles around a little. He pulls out a crumpled up receipt and a pen, then flips it over and scribbles something on the back. Then he extends it toward me.</p><p>I grab it- a little apprehensive, mind you- to find a phone number. Under it is what looks like the name of a business. ‘Devil May Cry,’ huh? A little on the nose, but not bad all things considered.</p><p>Without saying anything, he slices a portal in the air and steps through it. Well that’s that, I guess. Didn’t expect to get a pseudo business card today, let alone the rest of today’s events, but Red Grave’s never been a predictable place. With everything said and done, I guess it’s time to go back home.</p><p>It’s been an interesting day.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hope you guys had fun with this. Like I said, I can't promise regular updates, but I'll do my best.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Crop Circles</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Do demons have nothing better to do?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry for the wait, my keyboard pooped out on me for a few days.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Turns out I would need that number a lot sooner than I thought.</p><p>Today was supposed to be a normal day: wake up, lounge around, wait for my shift to start, rinse and repeat. And don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I hate it when things don't go my way. Those days are at least interesting.</p><p>But waking up to demons in my backyard wasn’t a pleasant surprise.</p><p>It’s only been a few weeks since the park incident, is my luck really that bad? Maybe I’m secretly a demon magnet.</p><p>What’s weirder is that they’re not moving. Most of them are just sitting around in a circle while a grim reaper looking thing cuts the grass around them. They could've picked anywhere else to have their glorified game of duck-duck-goose, but of course it has to be in my backyard.</p><p>So that’s where I am- by the kitchen counter, phone and receipt in hand, watching the Hell Convention from the glass doors.</p><p>I’m a little nervous to call, though. I mean yeah, the demons aren’t gonna deal with themselves, but I’m not sure if they’ll take this. I don’t know the cost, or how long it’ll take- hell, I’m not even sure this is a demon killing business.</p><p>But really, I have no other option. I could call the police, but something tells me they don’t have a very effective demon protocall. Guess I could deal with it myself if I wanna become a human slushie.</p><p>This is the only way.</p><p>I press call.</p><p>It’s at the third ring when the nerves start setting in. What if no one picks up? Like I said, it’s not like I have any other options. I’d have to get up and go, but there’s no telling if they’re around my house or not. Does my insurance plan cover demon related injuries-?</p><p>“Devil May Cry.” I nearly jump out of my skin, that catches me off guard. I don’t recognize the voice. What I do recognize, though, is the sound of this guy eating. Really taking your job seriously, huh?</p><p>Wait, what exactly do I say about this? Okay, chill out, as long as I don’t panic- “Uh yeah, there’s demons in my backyard.”</p><p>Smooth. Real smooth.</p><p>“... okay?” Uh oh, he sounds more serious and a little confused now. I almost prefer the chewing to this. “How did you get this number?”</p><p>Did I say something wrong? “Someone, uh, gave it to me. It was the other week at the park, he dealt with a horde and gave it to me.” Oh man, I can feel my anxiety skyrocketing. I’m tempted to hang up right now.</p><p>There’s some shuffling on the other line before he shouts for someone in the other room. I can’t exactly make out what he says at first, but the second part is more clear.</p><p>“... you give the shop number to anyone the other day, Vergil?”</p><p>There's more shuffling on the other line. All I can do is bounce on my heels and watch the demons like a stupid fish. Eventually, another voice chimes in. Thankfully I recognize this one. “Yes?”</p><p>“Yeah there’s um, demons. In my backyard.”</p><p>Another pause. I feel like I’m missing something. “Are they doing anything unusual?”</p><p>Aside from being in my backyard? I didn’t really think about it. I zone back in on the demons before continuing. “Nah, they’re kinda just standing around. One of them is cutting some sort of weird pattern in the grass.”</p><p>“An incantation,” he answers instantly. That doesn’t sound good. “If you don’t want a potential goliath summoning in your backyard, I suggest you give an address.”</p><p>“Oh yeah.” An address would also be important, who woulda thunk it? I give him the address and wait. I don’t know what a goliath is but I don’t feel like finding out.</p><p>With that, he hangs up. Guess I’m a sitting duck, for now. Hope he doesn’t take long-</p><p>The doorbell rings.</p><p>Oh yeah, he can teleport.</p><p>I check the window to make sure it’s him- are demons smart enough to use doorbells?- and sure enough, there he is. Back to the old digs, I see.</p><p>As much as I’d like to open the door and offer him a coffee, I really want this demon thing sorted out. I stick my thumb to the backyard, hoping he’ll get the message. Pretty sure he got the memo cause next thing I know, he flashes blue and disappears. Never thought I’d be relieved to hear the unholy screams of the damned.</p><p>Watching this from the comfort of my own home is quite the spectacle. I’d make popcorn, but looking away from this would be a waste. His dashing and slashing is crisp- can’t see a spec of blood on him. He’s getting it on my door, though. Whatever. Glass can be cleaned.</p><p>He’s done in just a few minutes. With the last of them gone, he cuts the grass around the patterns, and that’s that. Is it weird that I’m disappointed?</p><p>“That was fast,” I yell from the door. I know, I know, the demons are gone, but going outside doesn’t sound like a good idea.</p><p>He looks over at me without saying anything. Ah, the classic stoic act. Wouldn’t expect anything less.</p><p>“Alright.” Oh boy, time to bust out the ‘ol wallet. I was dreading this question. “How much is it gonna be?”</p><p>His gaze is way sharper than it should be right now. This is gonna cost me my liver, ain’t it? I shoulda expected this.</p><p>“That won't be necessary.”</p><p>“Huh?” Now that catches me off guard. Of all the people to extend their kindness like that, I wouldn’t expect it to be him. “Why?”</p><p>He doesn’t elaborate and I don’t know what to say, so an awkward silence washes over us. He must’ve gotten sick of it cause before I can say anything else, he slices a portal in the air and steps through it.</p><p>I’m still trying to sort out everything in my head right now. Why do I keep running into demons? It’s getting hard to chalk this up to bad luck, at this point. And he just left without having me pay- what’s up with this guy? And the other dude on the phone had to have been his brother, who else would-</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>That brother of his. He said something on the phone earlier. I didn’t think much of it at first, but…</p><p>Vergil.</p><p>His name is Vergil.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm surprised anyone decided to read this, honestly. I hope it makes your guys' day a little better. :]</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. A Snowy Day in Red Grave</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's the most inconveniencing time of the year.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>It's super late right now but I wanted to get this done. I got a long shift tomorrow so prolly won't have another one out by then.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It started snowing last Monday.</p><p>At first it wasn’t too bad- just a couple small flurries that melted away a few minutes after they fell. Over the course of a few days, though, it spiraled into inches of snow lining the streets. Who woulda thought little ‘ol Red Grave would have such bad weather?</p><p>Whatever, ‘s not like it affects me much anyway. I mean I mostly work indoors, so why would I be bothered? Jack Frost himself could knock down my door and it still wouldn’t be inconveniencing. That’s what I thought, at least.</p><p>Then my tires freeze to the ground.</p><p>Because y’know, this is exactly what I need to deal with right after a long day of customer service. How did this even happen? It’s not like there’s ice around the wheel, I could deal with that with a little patience. But the tires are just… stuck. I can't move them even if I want to.</p><p>Which, by the way, I do want to. It’s way too cold out, feels like I’m in a meat locker. My fingers are gonna freeze off at this rate. There’s no way I can get these unstuck on my own, though, so either I call up a tow guy or sit here and get frostbite. Great.</p><p>It’s when I hear the sound of footsteps approaching that I cut the stewing and turn around, though I can already guess who it is.</p><p>“Hey.” I don’t mean to sound as curt as I do, but man if I’m not irritated right now. “Why does it feel like we always meet when I’m going through it?”</p><p>“It may be good luck,” he says as his eyes shift down to the wheels. Good, I don’t need to explain the problem. Now that he's here, though, we’re the only two people in the lot right now- not a lot of people wanted fast food today, huh?- so I’m curious.</p><p>“Well, my ‘Guardian Devil,’ you’re pretty good at the whole demon killing schtick. Got anything for frozen tires?”</p><p>At that, he takes off his scarf and hands it to me. He crouches down, knee cracking some of the ice around it, and…</p><p>Okay, so I’ve seen a lot of crazy things in my life, especially after moving to Red Grave. I don't expect anything that out there. Not many things are able to surprise me anymore.</p><p>But seeing a man transform into a monster might be enough to do me in.</p><p>And he does it so casually, too. He’s just kneeling by the exhaust pipe, unmoving, skin flaking as grey and blue scales take their place. And that’s not it, he has a tail and horns and spikes and- wait hang on, he looks like the blue guy. Weird.</p><p>This is really, really weird.</p><p>Well, there’s a couple differences. Exhibit A: his horns are on fire. Yes- actual, tangible fire. Fire which, when close enough to the ice, melts it in seconds. He’s using fire that he spawned from his head… to defrost my car.</p><p>“...”</p><p>As I sit here completely flabbergasted, he stands up and morfs back into a human, dusting off his knees as if nothing happened. “I hope this answers your question.”</p><p>“... I…” I’ve never been at such a loss for words. This just gives me even more questions, all of which I have no idea how to ask. So he’s been part demon this whole time? I guess that makes sense, but also no, none of this makes any sense.</p><p>Focusing back on the present, at least the ice is gone. His weird demon fire managed to defrost my whole car. The logistics don’t matter as much as not becoming a popsicle.</p><p>“I don’t know what you just did but y’know what? You got the job done.” I reach over and pat him on the back, stepping up to the driver’s door. “Appreciate the help, Vergil.”</p><p>He stops and looks at me weirdly, then. Oh yeah, this is the first time I’ve ever called him by name.</p><p>“Your brother used your name the other week on the phone,” I say, not wanting to confuse the guy any further. “Don’t worry, I’m not a mind reader or anything.”</p><p>He gives an irritated sigh and complains to himself. “Leave it to Dante to give unneeded information.”</p><p>“His name is Dante?”</p><p>His eyes widen a smidgen when he realizes his mistake, then pinches the bridge of his nose. “You didn’t hear anything.”</p><p>“Whatever you say, Vergil.” Throwing jabs at him is too fun, I can’t help myself. The eye roll I get in return is rewarding enough.</p><p>Okay but really, I gotta get going. “As much as I’d love to sit and chat, I’ve gotta leave before I catch hypothermia. Until next time,” I joke-salute to him as I shut the door. He steps out from behind the car and gives a little wave before walking off. Wow, he actually said goodbye for once.</p><p>The ice is really melting, huh?</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Wow, sick ice pun at the end bro.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Followed by a Sick Day</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>I can deal with demon attacks, but the common cold? No way.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Oh yeah, it's sickfic time. Grab your allergy medicine.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Looks like I got home too late.</p><p>C’mon, it wasn’t like I was out for that long. Or was I? I mean I was out there for a few minutes before he showed up, but it didn’t feel like that long…</p><p>Either way, it was long enough for me to catch a cold.</p><p>It’s been three days since I had to call off work. The managers got mad, of course, because I can’t control my immune system. Sure, it’ll probably go away in a couple more days, but I hate having to stay home for this long. Just thinking of the pay I’ll lose is making me sicker-</p><p>Was that the doorbell?</p><p>As if I’m not in a bad enough mood. Whoever’s here must have a good reason, I don’t have the energy to deal with this right now. Watch me get my snot all over your girl scout cookies.</p><p>So I roll out of bed, pjs wrinkly and stained with mucus, and head to the door. If they wanna talk to me that bad, they’ll have to tolerate the clothes.</p><p>After what feels like way too long of a journey, I finally reach the door and turn the knob.</p><p>Of course there’s no one here.</p><p>Either I’m going senile or someone just ding-dong-ditched me. Seriously, now of all days I gotta get messed with? I swear if it's the neighbor's kids, so help me-</p><p>My foot nudges something. I didn’t even notice there was something down there.</p><p>Looking down greets me with a kinda obnoxious looking gift basket. How could I miss something with such bright packaging? Maybe I am going senile.</p><p>I can see a couple things already without opening it- some high end chocolate brand I don’t recognize, a few cans of soup, oh wow those soaps look fancy- this thing doesn’t look cheap.</p><p>As thoughtful as this is, I have no idea who left it here. I didn’t tell many people I was sick as it is, and no way was it a manager. Whoever sent it here clearly doesn’t want me to know either, cause it’s not signed. C’mon, you go outta your way to get an expensive basket and decide not to sign it? It’s got a pre bought ‘get well soon’ card on it and everything.</p><p>With not many options left, all I can do is look around from the door. Nothing really catches my eye on the right- well aside from my neighbor checking the mail without pants on, again- so I look to my left.</p><p>On the side of my house, I pinpoint a couple blue, spectral particles hanging in the air.</p><p>Ah. So that’s what happened.</p><p>Guess Vergil noticed I was out, huh? I mean I’m always there when he gets his shopping done, I guess that would make sense. That, or whoever they had in my place must’ve mentioned it to him, but he doesn’t do small talk with most people. He didn’t try to use the self check-out aisle again, did he?</p><p>Well that was nice of him, in any case.</p><p>I grab the handle and toss the basket in before shutting the door. Man, everytime I think I’ve got this guy figured out he throws another curveball. Not having me pay for the demon attack was one thing, then he helps me get my car outta the snow, and now this? Jeez, he shows his care in weird ways.</p><p>It’s kinda funny that he left, though. Okay well it’s not funny that he’s gone, but- he’s so weird. Like he leaves this basket at my house then dips before I can even thank him or something. It wouldn’t kill him to be appreciated, would it?</p><p>I wanna dwell on this further, but that soup is calling to me. I’ll just thank him the next time I see him. Hopefully I won’t feel like hot garbage by then. 'Till then, it’s time to chow down. I don’t have the energy to cook right now, though.</p><p>I hope this is microwavable.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm sorry for not answering comments, I don't know how to respond to them. But I've read all of them and they made me so happy, thank you all so much for the kind words. &lt;333</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Public Transit</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>I ran out of gas and half to take the bus. Just my luck.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey y'all. Hope you're having fun if you celebrate any holidays right now. And if you don't, I hope you're still having a good day. Anyway, here's a chapter.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I gotta take the bus, today.</p><p>I shoulda filled up on gas last night before heading home. In my defense, it was a long day at work and I was too pooped to care. But that’s the hill I was willing to die on, so I get to reap the benefits.</p><p>By benefits, I mean I need to deal with public transit.</p><p>So that’s why I’m waiting here at the bus station. There aren’t many other people around, but the bench is already taken. Having to stand around right after running around store aisles all day isn’t making me feel better.</p><p>It takes around fifteen minutes, but the bus finally shows up. Took it long enough, my feet are killing me. So help me if all the seats are taken… well I won’t do anything, but it’ll be annoying as all hell.</p><p>I walk up the steps and onto the bus. Looks like there’s enough seats, I’m in luck for once.</p><p>Out of the corner of my eye, I see a tuft of white hair sticking above one of the seats. How convenient. I walk over to the empty seat next to him without thinking.</p><p>He looks up at me before I say anything. “Hey, Vergil.” I don’t bother asking if I can sit next to him- not like he would say no. “Now what reason would you have to take a bus, huh?”</p><p>“There isn’t always a vacant area nearby to… depart from,” he chooses his words carefully. Most people still aren’t used to the idea of a man teleporting in front of them, go figure.</p><p>That reasoning still doesn’t sound right- most likely he just wanted to get away from Dante or something, but I’m not gonna push it. “Whatever you say.”</p><p>That train of thought is cut off by my very loud yawning. Dang, I’m way more worn out than I thought. Lucky I plopped down next to him, then.</p><p>“Wake me up when my stop gets here,” I say while leaning back in my seat. “Haven’t forgotten my address since the basket incident, yeah?”</p><p>He nods. “Two months isn’t enough to sully my memory.”</p><p>“Good, cause I need some shut-eye.” These bus chairs are way too stiff to get any good sleep in, but I’ll manage.</p><p>…</p><p>Uhg, what happened?</p><p>I’m awake again, unfortunately. I may be tired, but I ain’t loopy enough to not feel the world shaking. Oh, I’m still on the bus aren’t I? It couldn’t’ve been more than a half hour since I dozed off.</p><p>It’s when I open my eyes to check the time that I realize my face is smooshed into something. I peak to the left to check what I’m leaning on.</p><p>Oh yeah, I'm sitting next to Vergil. Well ‘next to’ has transformed into my cheek being practically fused into his right arm. He’s even too tall while sitting, I can’t reach his shoulder from here.</p><p>I should probably dislodge myself now that I’m awake. But I’m still sleepy, and his arm is warm. It couldn’t hurt to stay like this for a bit.</p><p>Ahg, but I’m too awake to go back to sleep. Knowing this guy, he probably knows I’m awake without having to look up from his book. Whatever, I might as well say something. “Whatcha reading?”</p><p>He glances down at me. I’m half expecting him to shoulder check me off of him, but he just shifts a little in his spot and looks back ahead. “A horror novel.”</p><p>“Hm.” Shoulda guessed. I’m not really much of a scholar myself, but I’m curious. “So you’re a horror fan, eh? Got any recommendations?”</p><p>“Nothing you would be interested in.” Well that was presumptuous. I mean he’s probably right, but still. “And I usually don’t read novellas. Even as a child, I mostly read poetry.”</p><p>Yup, sounds on brand for him. “Studious kid, huh? I believe it.”</p><p>My curiosity is piqued, I can’t help myself from asking about his past. “Speaking of, what was it like growing up as a half demon, anyway?”</p><p>He looks a little above his book and falters. Yuh oh, bad question. I mean if having a kid is enough of a sour spot, what could the rest of his past be like?</p><p>So I backtrack. “I mean you don’t gotta tell me about it. Prolly wouldn’t understand, what with the whole ‘being human’ thing ‘n all that.”</p><p>“No, it’s… fine,” he says after some time. “I just… need a moment.” He’s got this weird look on his face right now, like he’s weighing his options. “I’m unsure of where to begin.”</p><p>“Well, I mean,” yet again, I’m way too curious about this “you’re partially human, right? Who was wearing the demonic pants in the relationship- your mom or your dad?”</p><p>After that, he tells me about his past. Apparently his dad was Sparda. Yeah, the ‘Legendary Dark Knight,’ and whatnot. I never thought he was real- just some Boogie Man that parents could scare their kids into eating their veggies with. But no, he was real, and had kids to boot- twins, at that. His pops also gave him that sword of his. Yamato, he calls it, has been with him through a lot of bad stuff. What bad stuff, he doesn’t say, but I don’t wanna open a can of worms by asking.</p><p>Then he mentions that he never went to school, which I audibly gawk at. How did he never get a proper education? Must’ve spent a lot of time in the library as a kid, cause that’s hard to believe.</p><p>He doesn’t say much about his past after that. Must’ve gone a little too deep there. I don’t want him to just sit there and brood, though, so I ask him about his sword. Yamato’s magic, apparently, and I wanna know how that works.</p><p>After that, we just… talk. We don’t chat about anything in particular- nothing serious, at least- but we don’t need to. He’s actually halfway decent at casual conversations.</p><p>Before moving to Red Grave, I never thought I’d be leaning on a half demon, cracking jokes into the wind. But this…</p><p>This is nice.</p><p>After a while, the bus comes to a stop. It’s about time for me to get off, then.</p><p>“Alright, it was fun talkin’,” I say while standing up. “I’ll see ya around, Vergil.”</p><p>“Until then,” he says. It’s kinda dark now, but I swear he just cracked a smile. I’ve never seen him actually smile before, am I really awake?</p><p>I leave the bus and start walking home. Y’know, the day didn’t start off that great, but I guess it wasn’t so bad. I learned way more today about Vergil than I ever thought I would. He’s such a weirdo.</p><p>I wouldn’t have it any other way.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hope you guys had fun reading that. Have a good night/day, everyone!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Look Out for Flying Trash Cans</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Hopefully he doesn't feel bad about it.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I've been having a stressful week, so I hope you guys are ready for a healthy dose of whiplash.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Time to take another walk.</p><p>The weather’s finally getting better now that it’s mid-April, it’d be stupid not to go out and enjoy it. Sure, the last time I took a walk was a bit rocky, but lightning doesn’t strike the same place twice. Maybe I’ll get to take a leisurely stroll this time around.</p><p>Of course I can’t be that lucky.</p><p>I make it around halfway through the park before a demon corpse comes flying in my direction. It’s only off by a few feet so I can feel its blood splattered on my cheek. Welp, hope this doesn’t stain my sleeve too bad.</p><p>I scrub my face with it while turning to the right to see what’s up. Who else would be there except Vergil? He’s slicing and dicing his way through everything, it’s like watching a cheese grater go to work.</p><p>He skids to a halt for just a second and notices me staring, so I give him a wave. “Ey, Vergil. You havin’ fun over there?”</p><p>All he does in response is wipe the blood off Yamato and shifts his stance, then he’s right back into the fray. Can’t really do anything about this right now, so I might as well keep walking.</p><p>Some of the noises they make are pretty funny. Bones and skin squelching, grass being burnt to a crisp, corpses being tossed around like pizzas- it’s enough to give someone sensory overload. Pretty entertaining, though.</p><p>I glance back over at the action out of curiosity. Yup, it’s ridiculous. These things are getting desperate and it shows. I mean really, one of them just picked up a garbage can and chucked it at full force. That sounds like a sitcom bit, it’s too good. Man, what a crock of…</p><p>Hey that’s kinda funny, it almost looks like that thing is heading my way-</p><p>…</p><p>…</p><p>…</p><p>Uhg.</p><p>I can’t think right now. Where am I? I can’t see and my ears are ringing like crazy. Feels like I just got hit by a freight train.</p><p>Okay, focus… uhg, but focusing hurts. It’s like my head just split open or something. Okay, okay, what just happened-</p><p>Oh yeah. Trash can.</p><p>What a cruel twist of fate to be smacked face first with a trash can. I’m not gonna die from this, am I? Being taken out by a load of junk isn’t the way I wanna go. Well not if I can help it.</p><p>Against way too much of a struggle, I manage to crack my eyes open. Uhg, no, now everything is too bright, my eyes are burning. The only thing keeping me from tearing my retinas out is the shadow blocking out some of the sun.</p><p>Speaking of the shadow, it’s saying something. The ringing died down a bit, so I can vaguely hear something- is that my name?- being said ad nauseum. Just make it stop already.</p><p>So I do. With whatever strength I’m gaining, I lazily lift my arm and start smacking at the shadow. “Mnnmgnnngnshuddup…” is the best I can muster.</p><p>Okay, my senses are coming back to me a little. I can hear things more clearly now- the voice stopped, thank goodness- and my vision’s less blurry. I can vaguely recognize the figure next to me and its black trench coat. Finally figured out who was yapping in my ear, at least.</p><p>“Ey, Vergil,” I say as casually as I can. Dang, this is kinda awkward. I really just passed out in the middle of a fight, huh? “How’s it hangin’?”</p><p>Had I not just blacked out from catapulting garbage, the look on his face right now would be priceless. He looks like he just saw a ghost. Okay, it’s a relatively neutral expression for anyone else, but ya pick up on Vergilisms after a while.</p><p>“The ground won’t give you comfortable sleep, you know,” he says. Weird, usually his sarcasm is more biting, but this feels… off. “Are you well?”</p><p>“Eh, more or less,” I reply while trying to sit up. It’s only then that I notice the lack of havoc being wreaked. “How long was I out?”</p><p>He sighs a deep, deep sigh, and his shoulders lax a little. “The demons have been gone for a few minutes.”</p><p>“Ah.”</p><p>I don’t know what else to say right now. I know I just got hit by a hunk of metal and have a splitting headache, but I’m a little worried about him. I’ve never seen Vergil be… well, concerned. It’s freaking me out.</p><p>“You good, dude?” That’s such a stupid question, but I hate this. He’s emoting way more than he should be right now.</p><p>He goes stiff as a board and looks at me baffled, at that. His mouth opens and only to close it right after- he’s clearly struggling to find the right words. Asking that was a mistake.</p><p>He lets out a tsk, eventually. “I’ll never understand you, human.” He’s totally faking his chillness right now, it’s not even funny.</p><p>He rises from the ground and extends a hand. “Are you well enough to stand?”</p><p>“Good as I’ll ever be,” I say while grabbing his hand. Unfortunately, he hoists me up a little too fast and I grunt. “Oof, oh jeez,” I can’t help but to double over and wheeze. “Gimme a second.”</p><p>Oh boy, hoh boy, this stings. I know I’ll be fine, but sweet cheese on a holy cracker, I want out. I almost prefer being unconscious to this.</p><p>Even though I’m half folded over myself, I catch a glimpse of Vergil reaching out to me. He retracts the hand before it makes contact with my shoulder, but it’s so obvious.</p><p>After a hardy dose of pain, I finally straighten my back out. “Alright, okay. I’m good.” That’s not completely true, I prolly got concussed during that. Nothing a good ‘ol doctor visit can’t fix, though. “Sorry ‘bout that.”</p><p>Another weird look. He doesn’t feel bad about it, does he? That would suck.</p><p>He clears his throat again. “I’ll escort you to your house.”</p><p>As if I need an escort. Aside from the migraine, I feel relatively fine- I can manage. But man, rejecting his offer would be crappy given how moody he’s being.</p><p>“After you.”</p><p>So we walk in silence. Now I’m no mind reader, but something’s clearly bothering him. Does he really care about it that much? I mean this is Vergil- stoic, collected, ‘couldn’t-care-less-about-anyone-or-anything’ Vergil- with anxiety so palpable it hits almost as hard as the can did. He didn’t get replaced with a body double since I blacked out, did he?</p><p>We reach my front doorstep after a while. The silence has been killing me, I gotta say something.</p><p>“I appreciate the help, y’know.” I try. I don’t completely get the problem, but he looks guilty. “And I don’t blame you for it. So don’t go and angst about it, alright?” I give him a little reassuring pat on the arm to get the point across. “I’m good.”</p><p>“I…”</p><p>He looks conflicted, but I think I got the point across. Slowly, he nods without any gusto behind it. And then he’s gone- doesn’t even open a portal or anything, he just walks away.</p><p>…</p><p>Well, that could’ve gone better.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Don't worry guys, this isn't gonna become an uber-serious story all of the sudden. Hopefully I mixed in the casualness well enough, I'm a little worried for this one. Hope ya like it.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Local Demon Man Doesn't Know How Feelings Work</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>What're those portals made of, anyway?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry about the wait, I was playing video games. Anyway, time to bully Dante.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Huh, I haven’t seen Vergil in a while.</p><p>I think he’s avoiding me. Well, I don’t know that for sure, but he hasn’t gone shopping here in a while and I haven’t seen him around. C’mon, we bump into each other all the time, so anyone’s guess is as good as mine.</p><p>Welp, I can’t spend every waking moment worrying about him. And I don’t, but every now and then it pops back in my mind. It’s only been what, a week and a half since we last met at the park? Eh, the universe’ll prolly throw him back at my doorstep at some point.</p><p>I kinda zoned out for a bit, so consider me shocked when I look up and see a freakishly tall white haired guy in my lane.</p><p>That’s all fine and dandy, but here’s the catch: that’s not him. This guy’s hair is way longer, looks like he hasn’t shaved in months. And he stinks… wait.</p><p>“Are you Dante?”</p><p>“I got a fanclub now, eh?” He flashes a shit-eating grin while lining a treasure trove of pizzas on the belt. “Sorry, I don’t do autographs.”</p><p>A charismatic idiot- that’s just some of what I’ve heard about him, and he’s checking all the boxes. “I can see why Vergil doesn’t like you.”</p><p>Now that gets his attention. He leans on the shelf next to him and eyes me for a good second. Oh no, no way- does he think I’m a demon? Is it really that unlikely that anyone else would know about him?</p><p>Then he relaxes. “Y’know I get recognizing me, but Vergil? That’s a first.” Huh, guess it is that unlikely. “Surprised you could even wringe a name outta him.”</p><p>“You gave me the name, actually,” I say while scanning his food. Did he just take our entire pizza stock? “Demons in the backyard?”</p><p>“Demons in the…” he drones while squinting. Then comes the “Ohhhhhh,” followed by cackling. (Gee, thanks for laughing at my misfortune.) “Aw man, I remember you! Ah, Verge’s panties were in a twist when he got back.”</p><p>“Oh?” I wasn’t expecting that.</p><p>Another cackle. “Yeah, he came back with the most distraught look on his face. Whadja do, call his sword flaccid?”</p><p>Did I do anything? I mean I don’t remember saying something stupid. Then again, I got the memory span of a fruitfly. So I don’t respond.</p><p>When he’s done paying for his groceries, he snatches the recipt. Oh no, he’s got a weird look in his eyes. He pulls out a pen, flips it over and starts writing something. Why does this feel familiar?</p><p>After doodling on the back for a bit, he hands it back to me. “Actually, he’s been kinda pissy lately too and it’s getting on my nerves. Someone else should go talk to him before I blow a gasket,” he says, then strolls out before I can respond.</p><p>So, what’s on the fabled receipt? An address. Call it a hunch, but I think I know where this’ll lead me.</p><p>Oh, boy.</p><p>…</p><p>Devil May Cry.</p><p>I don’t know how I didn’t find this place sooner- it’s got a neon sign so obnoxiously bright, bet I could see it from my house. Y’couldn’t fault someone for mistaking it as a club.</p><p>Well whatever. My shift ended earlier so I thought I’d just stop by and get this out of the way. There’s no time like the present, as they say.</p><p>Right when I’m about to open the door, something crashes in the alleyway behind me. A mysterious noise coming from a dark alleyway? Oh joy, nothing suspicious about that.</p><p>Except when I turn around to look, I see him.</p><p>Demons eating from alleyway dumpsters, huh? At least it’s not humans. It looks like he just got done killing everything. Now’s my chance.</p><p>So I walk over to him. “Hey, Vergil-”</p><p>He stops mid anime sword sheath and looks over his shoulder. Immediately, he takes out Yamato and slices a portal in the air. Oh no, I’m not letting you get away!</p><p>Booking it down the street as fast as I can, I trail behind him as he enters the portal. Then I’m in.</p><p>And I’m lost.</p><p>Everything looks ethereal and weird. It’s like I’m staring straight into a black hole. And- wait, which way did I come from? C’mon it’s a portal, I came in one way. It didn’t disappear, did it? And where’s the other side? Am I stuck in here? Oh no, OH NO-</p><p>And then someone grabs me by the back of the shirt and tosses me right back out the entrance.</p><p>In my dazed confusion, I still recognize the figure in front of me. The frustrated figure, at that. Yuh oh.</p><p>“You fool. Do you realize how dangerous that was? These are unsafe for humans, do you even-” Oh boy, he’s ranting.</p><p>But y’know what? I’m frustrated too. “Okay okay, I get it. But I wanted to talk to you man. You just left as soon as I showed up, what gives?”</p><p>Then he stops. He fidgets around, looks over at the wall next to him, looks like he’s about to say something but doesn’t. He’s nervous.</p><p>But finally he speaks. “I… felt awkward about our last encounter,” he says slowly. He’s picking his words carefully, I can tell. “I didn’t know if you, erm, wanted to see me.”</p><p>I blink stupidly. “Why wouldn’t I?”</p><p>He blinks stupidly back. “You were bludgeoned by a garbage can.”</p><p>Another stupid blink. “Okay, so?”</p><p>Then there’s an uncomfortably long pause. If ever there was a titular awkward silence, this is the one.</p><p>And then he cracks. He runs a hand through his hair and a deep, guttural noise comes from his throat. “So?” He throws his hands up. “I don’t understand you. You treat everything so casually- too casually. Demons, pulling me out of a tree, being knocked out- why wouldn’t you be mad at me for any of that?”</p><p>“Mad at you?” What gives him that idea? “Well it’s not like you caused any of that.”</p><p>He sighs. “Look, my bloodline has been hunted by demons since before I was born. Even if unintentional, this may be my doing.”</p><p>I stop to think for a second. Hunted by demons, eh? “If I didn’t wanna deal with demons all the time, I could've moved anywhere else,” I say. “I mean this is Red Grave, for Pete’s sake- I’m pretty sure I knew I was walking into the demon lounge room from day one.”</p><p>That gives him pause. He didn’t consider any of that till now, did he?</p><p>Did he really blame himself for all that?</p><p>So I continue. “That wasn’t your fault. And chances are, none of the demon encounters were your fault either. So don’t feel bad about it or I’ll actually be mad at you.” That’s an empty treat, but still.</p><p>“... okay.” He looks at me, then he looks back at the wall. “I… care about your wellbeing.”</p><p>Was Vergil just willingly emotionally vulnerable? Maybe he did get replaced with a body double, afterall.</p><p>But I recover faster. “D’aw, that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.” After all this, I wanna bug him just a little. “C’mere, bozo.”</p><p>And then I give him a nice, totally not awkward hug. He definitely doesn’t squirm or make weird noises, and he absolutely doesn’t threaten to stab me if I don’t let go. Not like he would, anyway.</p><p>Eventually I let go, and once again, the look on his face is priceless. Ah, I missed this.</p><p>But all good things must come to an end. “Welp, I’m gonna head back home,” I say while stretching. Wow, it got pretty dark out. “I can trust you to come getchur shopping done later this week, yeah?”</p><p>The smallest, most missable smile crosses his face. “Of course.”</p><p>And all is right with the world.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Vergil needs to invest in a therapist or something lol.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. The Storm that is Approaching</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>The real storm was the demonic friend we made along the way.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>School starts again tomorrow... well, here's another chapter before that happens.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s raining pretty bad, right now.</p><p>Why do we need to get April Showers in May? There was no sign of rain this morning. Damned weather reporters getting their predictions wrong, a warning woulda been nice. But no, I gotta be stuck in the middle of a cafe with no way of getting home dry.</p><p>At least I’ve got company.</p><p>Y’see, I walked in here a few minutes ago intending to get a coffee and dip. Well lo and behold, it turns out Vergil had the same idea. I shoulda known he’d be a caffeine addict.</p><p>So y’know, we sat down and talked for a while. Nothing to do, nowhere to be- it was nice while it lasted. But of course, the universe took that as a golden opportunity to literally rain on my parade.</p><p>Thus brings us to the present: standing outside the cafe doors, just far enough under the pergola where we can’t be drenched.</p><p>Well, this is annoying. “Uhg. I can’t win, can I?”</p><p>“Maybe if you complain loud enough, Mother Nature will grant you a boon,” he says like a smug bastard. Ever the comedian, as always. What else can I do other than complain, anyway?</p><p>“Oh, hardy har har.” I don’t even know why he’s sassing me, he’s stuck here too. “Well, Mr. All Powerful, why don’t you think of so-”</p><p>I can’t get the thought out before he disappears. Oh yeah, he can teleport. Why do I keep forgetting that?</p><p>But he immediately comes back and snickers. I’ve never wanted to kick a man so badly.</p><p>Hey, that gives me an idea. “Can you teleport other people?”</p><p>He thinks for a second before responding. “I’ve never thought to try.”</p><p>“Welp, it’s worth a shot.” I hold out one of my hands so he can take it- I’d imagine you have to make contact for this, yeah?- but he hesitates.</p><p>“I just told you I’ve never tried it. What if something unfortunate happens?” That’s a fair point. Getting turned into a pile of goop because of some weird demon magic would be pretty bad.</p><p>This has got me curious, though. I wanna see what happens. “Hey, you shouldn’t knock it till we try it.” I reach down and grab his hand before he can say anything else. “Alright, let ‘er rip.”</p><p>He still looks uneasy, but I think he’s curious too. He looks up the street to make sure no one’s around. The next thing I know, he vwoops away.</p><p>I’m still here, though.</p><p>So he comes back. “Well that idea was a bust.” Honestly I’m a little disappointed, at least turning into goop woulda been more interesting. He looks relieved, though, so at least one of us is satisfied.</p><p>We stand here for another minute. I’m almost surprised he decided to stay here with me. Guess I’ll just have to wait this out…</p><p>Wait, I got another idea. “Say, you can conjure swords in the air, yeah?”</p><p>“Yes?” he says, a little confused.</p><p>“And if you wanted to, you could hold those swords, right?” Oh, this is genius.</p><p>He nods while giving me a funny look. “I don’t see what you’re getting at.”</p><p>“Well if you can summon swords, doesn’t that mean you can make other things that have handles? Maybe one that could, oh I don’t know, keep someone dry in the middle of the rain?”</p><p>The look on his face is telling me that he isn’t getting the point. “An umbrella. I’m talking about an umbrella.” Excuse me for the deadpan, but he shoulda seen that one coming.</p><p>“An umbrella…” He stares out into space for a second and thinks. “I’ve never tried summoning anything other than weapons and doppelgänger, but what if…“</p><p>The ghost has a name, huh? And wow, I’m surprised he didn’t try to summon anything else until now… actually no, I’m not surprised. The man walks around with a katana in his coat, of course he’d only think about weapons.</p><p>He looks around to make sure we’re alone again, then he holds out his hand. Some blue sparks light up the air for a second, then something materializes.</p><p>I say ‘something’ because it’s unrecognizable. It’s got the handle and embroidering of a sword with a blade looking thing sticking out of it. Instead of a pointy katana end, though, it has what looks like a saw blade sticking out on top. It’s curved downward and has a ton of spikes on it. Like, a ton of spikes.</p><p>It looks waterproof, though.</p><p>“This is the weirdest umbrella I’ve ever seen.” I mean when you think about it, it vaguely resembles an umbrella. Apparently he can only make things like this if they’re weapons. Duly noted.</p><p>He holds it out in the rain to test it. Sure enough, it’s keeping the ground under it nice and dry.</p><p>“Well.” It’s just about time we get a move on, then. “Lead the way.”</p><p>“You don’t want me to summon another one for you?” He asks.</p><p>Oh no, no way am I touching one of these. “You see how many spikes that thing has? If I drop it, I’m done for.”</p><p>“Hm. Fair enough.” And with that, we leave.</p><p>We start walking to my place first since, y’know, I can’t make demon umbrellas with my mind. We don’t say much on the way there, but it’s not an awkward silence. Rain makes for a pretty relaxing backdrop noise, afterall.</p><p>Eventually, we get to my doorstep. I step out from under the umbrella and reach for the door. “We’re gonna have to experiment with those summoning powers of yours.”</p><p>He chuckles in response. That isn’t a no, though.</p><p>“Welp, it’s been fun. Catch ya on the flip side, Vergil.”</p><p>“See you then,” he says. He cuts a portal in the air, and that’s that. Huh, I wonder what the difference is between the portal and his regular teleporting. Another thing I’ll have to ask him next time we meet.</p><p>I’m looking forward to it.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I always wondered what else he could summon.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Time Spent with the Ghost</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>For being one in the same, these two sure don't have a lot in common.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey guys! I hope you like my charactarization of Doppelänger, I'm not sure how to feel about it yet.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I’m finally gonna go on a normal walk today.</p><p>Sure, the first two attempts didn’t turn out so well, but y’know what they say: third time’s a charm. And c’mon, summer just started. I gotta get outta here and get some vitamin D, demons be damned.</p><p>But speak of the devil(s), and they doth appear. Good grief.</p><p>I’m not too surprised to see Vergil here. It’s like wherever demons attack, he’s sure to follow. Though it’s weird that it’s always him, is Dante really that lazy? Maybe they decided to split sections of the city to watch or something. Who knows.</p><p>Either way, I might as well wait for him to finish. I mean it’d be rude to sit here and watch without saying anything-</p><p>Huh. Is it just me or did the air get way frostier?</p><p>A ton of the cold is coming from the left, I wonder what’s up- OH FU-</p><p>Oh, it’s just the ghost. Er uh, Doppelgangär? Think that’s what he called it.</p><p>Does Vergil already know I’m here? I look back over at him, but he’s still bashing demons’ heads in like nothing happened. He might not’ve noticed me.</p><p>So how did it (or is it he? I’ll ask him later) get here, then? Can Vergil subconsciously summon things?</p><p>I wonder if it’ll understand English. “Hey there, Doppel.” Well that question is answered pretty quick. It’s looking down at me and waving enthusiastically. Cute. “Y’nearly gave me a heart attack. Whatcha doin’ over here?”</p><p>Alright, so there’s a couple things I gotta know about it, one being that it can’t talk. Well that or it chooses not to, but something tells me it’d be more of a Chatty Cathy if it could. I can tell cause of the second thing I learn: this guy really likes attention. It starts waving its arms around and mimicking things with its hands- is it trying to play charades?</p><p>I don’t really understand it though, so I have to cut it off. “Alright, bud. You and him are pretty different, y’know.” ‘Pretty different’ is the understatement of the century. I’d never be able to tell they’re one in the same if I didn’t already know.</p><p>It nods in response. Well then, it looks like I got a hyperactive ghost on my hands. Might as well have fun with this.</p><p>“Hey, Doppel,” I say while pointing toward the road. “‘Ol Vergil doesn’t let you out too often, huh? Wanna take a walk with me?”</p><p>At that, the thing nearly bounces on its heels in excitement. Jeez, it’s just a walk, calm down.</p><p>But calm down it does not. It grabs my hand and starts sprinting down the road with me in tow. “Woah, hey-!”</p><p>Oh gee, my legs aren’t built for this. I gotta get it to slow down or my shoes are gonna burn. “Buddy, it’s called a walk, not an Olympic dash! Slow down a little!”</p><p>After that, it slows down and lets go. The thing slumps its shoulders and gives me an apologetic look. This thing has the demon equivalent of puppy eyes, I swear.</p><p>“Ah don’t worry about it, bud. Let’s just keep it slower, alright?”</p><p>And on we walk. Doppel calms down a lot- it’s taking in its surroundings with a pointy yet very noticeable smile. This thing must be happy to be free.</p><p>So if this thing is a part of Vergil, what does that make it? I mean this is Vergil we’re talking about. Something tells me that even if he could, he wouldn’t want to be this excited or sociable. Or maybe it’s got a different personality, but the same interests. Uhg, this is hurting my brain-</p><p>Someone’s walking down the road. Oh no, how am I supposed to explain this?</p><p>Alright focus, there’s gotta be somewhere around here this guy can hide. That tree, maybe?- no, it’s not thick enough. But maybe that building can- nah, it’s too far away. We’d never make it in time.</p><p>In the midst of my panicking, the stranger stops in front of me. This was a horrible idea, oh jeez oh no-</p><p>“Are you alright?”</p><p>I look at her confused for a second, then turn to the left. It looks like a certain 6’5” spectral demon isn’t here right now. Well that’s all fine and dandy, but I have no idea how to explain to this woman that no, I wasn’t panicking in the middle of the street for no reason. There’s a perfectly good explanation for this, I swear.</p><p>“Yeah. I just, erm,” shoot, what’s a good excuse? “dropped my wallet?”</p><p>The woman stares at me, extremely concerned. “You mean the wallet sticking out of your right pocket?”</p><p>I look down at my right pocket and sure enough, there’s my wallet. I wanna disappear, this is so awkward.</p><p>“Oh wow! Wouldja look at that, turns out it’s right here after all!” I start speed walking away before she can say anything. “Thanks for the help but I gotta go!”</p><p>When I’m outta her line of sight, I sigh really loudly. Oh man, that was a close one. But where did-?</p><p>Then Doppelgänger reappears in front of me. Ah, it can just do that. Great.</p><p>“You’re killing me, Doppel,” I say, joking but still weary. Ay ay ay, I’m gonna develop ulcers at this rate. It looks happy, though, so I can’t stay mad for long. “Why don’t we getcha back to the ‘ol fart, huh?”</p><p>So we start walking back. It’s been a half hour or so, the demons’ve probably been turned into a fine paste by now. Though I’m a little upset, hanging with Doppel has been fun. Hopefully Vergil’ll bring it out more often.</p><p>We get back to him. We’re a fair distance away, and I can’t help to notice his back is turned to us. Ohhhh, this gives me an idea.</p><p>“Hey, Doppel,” I start whispering. This is a stupid idea, but a hilarious one nonetheless. “Wanna play a prank with me?”</p><p>At that, it starts rubbing its claws together mischievously. Perfect. “Follow my lead.”</p><p>The idea’s simple: sneak up behind him and give ‘im a little spook. Okay, realistically there’s no way we should be able to surprise him, but this’ll be hysterical if it works. Being startled by another version of yourself? Man, the look on his face would be priceless-</p><p>But then Doppel picks me up by the back of the shirt and Vergil turns around. Oh.</p><p>“Thought you could pull a fast one on me, hm?” So he knew I was here, huh? Aw man, this is disappointing.</p><p>I cross my arms while Doppel holds me like a scared cat. “You’re no fun.” I spent the day with Doppel just to be betrayed in the end. Can’t believe this. Well either that, or… “Did you know I was here the whole time?”</p><p>“Although I can’t always control Doppelgänger’s actions,” he starts while Doppel puts me down, “I choose when it comes out.” Ah, so Doppel is an it after all. And I guess that explanation makes sense. But wait, something still doesn’t add up.</p><p>“Then why’d you let it out in the first place?” What, did he think I needed a walking buddy that badly? “I woulda waited for you to finish up, y’know-”</p><p>Wait. He was in the middle of fighting demons.</p><p>…</p><p>Oh, no way.</p><p>I can’t help but grin like a stupid, smug asshole. Immediately, he starts shifting on his feet and looking around awkwardly. Oh, that’s totally what just happened.</p><p>“You wanted me to have a bodyguard, didn’t you?”</p><p>“No, that’s not- I didn’t-”</p><p>“Nah, you were concerned about me! You were concerned about me, that’s so cute-”</p><p>He groans frustratedly and turns around. “Whatever.”</p><p>As he and… er, himself start walking away, Doppel turns around and waves at me enthusiastically again. Vergil pulls out Yamato and slices it away. “That’s enough out of you!” He starts frustratedly grumbling as he leaves. And then he’s gone.</p><p>Aw, he was totally worried.</p><p>That’s adorable.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I really appreciate you all reading this. It genuinely makes me really happy whenever I get a new comment, you guys make my day. &lt;333 Have a nice rest of the day (or night, depending on where you are.)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Devil May Exterminate</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Devil May Cry is a versitile company, eh?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry about not updating for a while, I had a lot of school stuff to do. Here's a fun one.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s a rat in my kitchen.</p><p>Y’see I was just going about my business, beginning to cook some nice ravioli. I never really cook outside of microwaving things, but today I was gonna treat myself. Cooking some ravioli, singing some random pop song completely offkey- just an average Saturday, yeah?</p><p>But then that thing scurried out from under my stove.</p><p>It’s under one of the counters right now, I’m not sure which one. Using a ladle as a weapon probably won’t be very effective, but it was the closest thing to me. No way am I running to the knife holder. Yelling profanities isn’t getting me anywhere, though, I gotta do something.</p><p>Luckily, my phone was right next to the ladle. I gotta make a call and fast. What’s the number for the exterminator? Wait no, why would I call them? It’s one rat, I’d be wasting their time. But that doesn’t leave me with many other options.</p><p>Wait, the fridge. In my frenzy, my eyes dart over to the number magnetted to the fridge. ‘Devil May Cry…’</p><p>Do I even bother? Vergil’ll prolly kill me for bothering him. But I mean I’ve known Vergil for what, a year and a couple months now? He’ll have to throw a dog a bone, just this once.</p><p>I can hear the thing skittering around. Nope nope nope, I’m not waiting anymore. I start frantically typing the number before my brain catches up to me.</p><p>It takes two rings before a voice answers. “Devil May Cry. Trish speaking.” Well shoot, if I ask anyone about this aside from Vergil they won’t take it seriously. Okay, he probably won’t take it seriously either, but that’s beside the point.</p><p>“Hey there, Trish. Vergil mentioned you a couple times. Speaking of which, you mind putting him on the phone for a second?” I can’t help the shakiness of my voice. She’s gonna think I’m being held at gunpoint or something, yeesh. “It’s, uh, kinda important.”</p><p>There’s a pause before she sighs and puts the phone down. Each second that passes feels like an eternity, the suspense is killing me.</p><p>After what feels like way too long, someone picks up. “Yes?”</p><p>“Hehehey, Vergil! My buddy, my pal!” The panic in my voice is palpable. “Sorry to bother ya, but I’m in a little bit of a pickle. Y’see, there’s this thing in my house and-”</p><p>Before I can finish the sentence, the rat scuttles out from under the counter next to me. I can’t help but yelp and drop the phone. Defensively clutching a ladle right after jumping on the table like a scared cat was not how I envisioned this Saturday going. Uhhhhhhg oh no…</p><p>In the middle of my panicking, a familiar aetherial noise comes from my front room and Vergil runs into my kitchen, Yamato in hand. “What’s going on?”</p><p>“There’s a rat,” I yell while frantically pointing at the other counter.</p><p>That look of alarm he initially ran into my kitchen with turns into bewilderment. A thick, awkward silence falls between us.</p><p>“A rat.” He says eventually, completely dumbfounded. “You called me here, sounding as if the world was crumbling around you… for a rat.”</p><p>“Sorry, man, I kinda panicked.” Yeah, calling might’ve been a dumb idea. But what else was I gonna do? “I didn’t have many other options.”</p><p>“Clearly,” he says while motioning at my fit of hysteria. “Look at you. You’re balking over vermin, of all things-”</p><p>Our lovely friend the rat takes this opportunity to make a beeline toward the couch. Right as the thing runs out, Vergil transforms into that demon thing and starts floating so his feet aren’t touching the ground.</p><p>Even while panicking, I sneer. “Oh really? ‘You’re balking over vermin, of all things-’”</p><p>“Quiet, you.” Ah, the classic Vergil grumble. He knows I’m right but won’t admit it. During my content cackle, he morphs back into a human and reaches for his sword again.</p><p>“Uh uh, no way!” He turns around and looks at me, confused. “I can clean the kitchen, but it’s in the front room now. No way am I letting you get rat guts on my carpet.”</p><p>He lets out an exasperated sigh. “Well what do you suggest, then?”</p><p>Okay think, think. We need to get it out from under the couch and trap it. But how do we do it…?</p><p>Hm. “Alright this is a longshot, but you need to do what I say here, alright?”</p><p>“Taking orders from a human weaker willed than a rat?”</p><p>“Hey it startled you too! Now can it and hear me out.”</p><p>We slowly creep towards the couch to try and sneak up on it (totally not out of fear or anything). “Alright, y’know how I said we’d test out those other summon abilities of yours?” I point to the underside of the couch. “Those summon things are bright, yeah? Summon a couple swords or whatever down there and nudge it out.”</p><p>“They’re called mirage blades…” Of course that’s what they’re called. How pretentious.</p><p>“Oh potayto, potahto. Just make it.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes and summons a sword behind the rat. The dull side of the blade pats it a couple times and it goes running.</p><p>I bolt up. “Alright it’s out! Try trapping it in a little wall of blades or something.”</p><p>“W- you didn’t think to tell me this beforehand?!”</p><p>“I just thought of it- look just, it’s running around- just trap it!”</p><p>We then proceed to spend around two and a half minutes trying to trap it in a cage of swords. It’s running around like a madman- everytime we almost have it, it scutters away like its life depends on it. All of this for a rat.</p><p>But, against all odds, he traps it. “Okay!... alright.” I walk up to the bizarre knife box, slowly and carefully. “Now then, y’think you summon a couple more for me real quick?”</p><p>He doesn’t even say anything snarky before spawning them next to me. I hold them both, then slowly pick up the rat with them. “Alright, alright, lift them up.”</p><p>At that, he makes the summon swords float up with the rat in between them. Well scratch demon tongs off the list of summon abilities, then.</p><p>I motion for Vergil to follow me as I dart to the kitchen door. Again, slowly and carefully, he hovers the bonafide demon chopsticks to the door. Good thing the rat isn’t thrashing around or anything.</p><p>With the door opened, all he has to do now is put the rat down. But without warning, the little dude starts squirming around. Before either of us can think rationally, the swords shoot out and over my backyard fence. It’s gone in a few seconds.</p><p>We stare at where the rodent turned projectile once was for a good few seconds. Then I spin to look at him, completely confounded. “What was that?”</p><p>“I, er…” He’s still sheepishly looking at the now empty air. “I panicked.”</p><p>…</p><p>He panicked.</p><p>The chuckles that rip outta my throat quickly turn into hysterical laughter. We really just spent so much time and energy on a stupid rat, huh? That is ridiculous. But oh man, this is hurting my sides. I gotta lean on him to make sure I don’t fall over.</p><p>And to my absolute shock, he joins in. Sure, it’s not as hysterical as mine, but that’s a genuine laugh if ever I’ve heard one. Yup. Absolutely ridiculous.</p><p>It takes us a good minute and a half to calm down. “Vergil, buddy,” I force out in between wheezes. “You’re taking years off my life.”</p><p>“Unintentionally,” he says while trying to stifle his amusement. “Unintentionally.”</p><p>“Whatever, man.” I finally pick myself up and motion back to the door. “Y’wanna stay for dinner? I was in the middle of making ravioli before… well, y’know.”</p><p>“I could tell.” His attempts at sass are way less biting now that his guard is down. “And I don’t see why not.”</p><p>“Great,” I start while walking back inside. I turned the stove off before he showed up, right? Well it’ll probably be fine regardless, a little burnt ravioli never hurt anyone.</p><p>“Hope ya like it welldone.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm gonna try to get another chapter done in the few couple days. Like I said, sorry for the slow updates. Have a good one, y'all.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Down to Earth</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Customer service! Totally fun and not at all emotionally scarring, right?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This'll be a little bit of a different chapter, so trigger warning for panic attacks. Got some notes at the end if you wanna read them.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Okay, just gotta calm down.</p><p>Why do I feel so shaky all of a sudden? Today was just about the same as any other day, there’s no reason I should feel like this. Alright, maybe there were a couple hiccups- slept kinda restlessly last night, so I’ve been running on fumes all day. But then I got to work and, well, this one customer kinda flipped out at me. I’m usually well equipped with bad customers, but that lady was relentless. I know I shouldn’t feel too bad about it, but man sometimes it just- some days are too-</p><p>C’mon, calm down. Relax.</p><p>But it’s so hard. My hands can’t stop shaking. It feels like the air isn’t getting to my lungs, I’m more stumbling out the back door than walking, everything looks blurry and my head feels fuzzy-</p><p>This is pretty bad, isn’t it?</p><p>Luckily my shift just ended, at least. I grabbed my jacket from the breakroom and made it three steps out the door before this started. Guess this is karmic punishment for going into customer service, huh?</p><p>At this point I’m just trying to ground myself back in reality. The feeling of the ground beneath my feet, the brick against my back as I slide down the wall, my fingernails digging into my palms just to feel something.</p><p>Focus.</p><p>Please.</p><p>…</p><p>I can’t do this.</p><p>Welp, here comes the self hatred thoughts. Moments like these make it hard not to think about, though- I can’t sleep right, can’t deal with customers, can’t even control my own feelings. Feels like I can’t do anything right.</p><p>Uhg.</p><p>I’m too out of it to notice the sound of footsteps. Someone had to park in the back parking lot now, of all times? Shit, I wanna get up and run but my legs are shaking too badly. It’s worse than I thought.</p><p>Whoever’s here clears the distance between us pretty fast. They sit down next to me, just close enough to see out of my periphery.</p><p>Well, shit. I don’t want him to have to deal with this.</p><p>If I could, I’d lie through my teeth right now and try to tell him everything’s just peachy, but I’m a sitting duck at the moment. Great, now I can’t even talk properly? Yup. This is way worse than I thought.</p><p>Even though I can’t talk, I gotta do something. I instinctively turn to him to try and apologize, maybe even just motion for him to leave so I can sort this out on my own-</p><p>But I’m greeted with a hand, instead.</p><p>It’s not intrusive or anything- he’s just holding it out next to me, more an offer than anything. So… he really doesn’t mind?</p><p>He’d really do this for me?</p><p>With a force that would probably hurt any normal person, I cling to it for dear life. Anything to bring myself back to Earth.</p><p>I’m not sure how much time passes after that, but we don’t say anything. The sound of me hyperventilating is the only thing I can hear. But it’s getting better.</p><p>The ground beneath me. The wall against my back. The feeling of another person being next to me, a hand in my own. Reality.</p><p>And slowly but surely, my breathing evens out.</p><p>I’m still shaken up from all that, but things are getting better. I can probably at least offer him an explanation.</p><p>So I try. “S-sorry,” I say in between gasps. “Didn’t mean to-to turn your hand into a stress ball or anything, ha-h-” I try to laugh, but it comes out strangled. Sounds like a pigeon started choking.</p><p>“I need no explanation,” he says. It’s still a little hard to hear him through the fuzz. “It’s fine.”</p><p>I take a few more deep breaths before continuing. “Yeah, but just- don’t wanna bother you.”</p><p>There’s a small silence before he says anything. “I’ve had my share of episodes in the past, regrettable as they may have been.” A sigh. “So I understand.”</p><p>Had his share of episodes, huh? Hard to imagine a half demon having a panic attack, let alone Vergil, but… well, it’s awfully human of him.</p><p>But I don’t need to say that.</p><p>We spend the next few minutes in relative silence. I’m still cooling my nerves down, but things are coming back more clearly. The early autumn trees changing color. The humming of cars as people get where they need to go. A steady grip on my hand, unmoving but still there. Grounding.</p><p>Calming.</p><p>“Thank you.” There’s nothing else for me to say right now. And if I’m completely honest, I’m pretty drained from all that.</p><p>He doesn’t respond. Still not great at accepting thank you’s, huh? Looks like we’ve both got something we gotta work on.</p><p>He pulls me up with him as he stands and it knocks me off balance for a second. “You tryin’ to give me whiplash or something?” This time, my laugh is real.</p><p>“Hm.” I think he’s trying to smirk right now, but- nope, that’s definitely a smile. He can’t even feign cockiness right now? That’s new. “You’re well enough to leave on your own?”</p><p>“Yeah, I’m good. Honest.” And yeah, I really am being honest here. Him being here made things a lot better. “But, uh…”</p><p>“Hm?”</p><p>“Were you, uh, planning on letting go anytime soon?”</p><p>“Huh?” We both look down at the same time and yup, he’s still holding my hand. Did he really just forget about it? “Oh. Right.”</p><p>So he lets go and clears his throat. “Well, I’m glad you’re alright.” Usually I’d jab at him for being embarrassed like this, but I’m super pooped.</p><p>“Thanks man,” I say. “Really.”</p><p>“... anytime.”</p><p>And after that, we go our separate ways. I feel a little bad for keeping him from getting his shopping done for so long, but I’m glad he was here. That wouldn’t have gone so smoothly without him.</p><p>I’m glad I wasn’t alone.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Hey guys. I wanna say I've been doing great but things've been hard, recently. At least writing this made me feel better. Hopefully this made someone else feel better, too. Have a good day/night, everyone.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Arcades Still Exist</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>What's a guy to do when he doesn't understand his grandkids? Stop by the local arcade, of course!</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, guys. This is a bit of a longer chapter, haha. I kept thinking of funny things to write, though, so I had to keep going lol.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Ah, November.</p><p>I’m almost convinced it doesn’t exist. Does anything really happen in November? I mean sure, there’s birthdays or whatever, but nothing super important goes on. It all just bleeds right into December. People are already getting their holiday shopping done and everything. Jeez, is it that urgent to get everything a month in advance?</p><p>Well, regardless, I’m stuck here in a stupidly busy store with ravenous customers. Lucky me.</p><p>At least they didn’t put me on a register. Y’see, they have more people come in for the holidays cause it gets busier, so there’s a few people- myself included- who’re just standing around to help customers. Simple, right? They threw me in electronics, so I’m just opening cases for games and movies. Nothing too crazy.</p><p>Now, if there’s one person I never expected to see in the video game aisle, it’s Vergil.</p><p>“Hey, man,” I say while strolling up to him. He’s kneeling next to the display for some new game I can’t afford. Something tells me it wouldn’t be up his alley, though. “I hear this one’s pretty alright. Though I gotta ask, what’re you doing in the video game section anyway?”</p><p>He grunts as he stands up with a conflicted look on his face. “This isn’t for me.” Oh, you don’t say? Coulda guessed that one. “My grandkids mentioned being fond of this series, but I’m not sure which one they wanted.”</p><p>“Well I’d wager it’s the most recent one-” Wait. Did he say grandkids? Since when does he have grandkids?</p><p>“Most likely.” Oh, so he’s just gonna gloss over that. Cool. “I’m not sure what kids are into, these days.”</p><p>Yeesh, he says that like he’s seventy. “What are you, an old man? Honestly I’m waiting for you to say ‘Back in my day, all we needed were arcades and a pocket full of quarters,’” I start fake grumbling.</p><p>Instead of the intended annoyed reaction, he looks at me half surprised. And then, completely earnestly, he asks “Do arcades still exist?”</p><p>Are… are you serious?</p><p>“What, you think they tossed every arcade off the face of the Earth? Of course they still exist,” I say, both jokingly and a little concerned. Which well sheltered rock does he live under?</p><p>“I haven’t had the opportunity to experience many facets of modern living. Let’s just say I’ve been, er…” he starts, looking to the side to try and find a way to put it. “Preoccupied, let’s call it.”</p><p>“... whatever you say, man.” Yuh oh, sounds like another touchy subject. Don’t wanna open that can of worms.</p><p>But hey, now that he mentions it, “Y’know, they’ve got this one arcade downtown- ah shoot, where is it?- well it’s pretty well lit, it’s hard to miss.” I mean arcades aren’t really my thing, I kinda just saw it in a commercial the other day. But now’s too good of an opportunity to pass up. “Actually, I’m off work tomorrow. Wanna come check it out with me?”</p><p>He looks surprised. “Well,” he starts, clearly faking how chill he’s being, “I am curious to see how much they’ve changed. I’ll humor you this time.”</p><p>“Great. Meet me there at three-thirty,” I say while stepping around him. “And by the way, it’s this one.” I pull out the key for the display case and take out the game he’s looking for. “It’s gonna be fifty bucks.”</p><p>…</p><p>Yup, it wasn’t too hard to find.</p><p>The ad made it look bigger. It’s actually just this one story building with these huge neon signs on the roof. Other than the eye bleeding lights, this place is pretty quaint.</p><p>Hm. It’s taking him a little longer than I thought it would.</p><p>It’s just about three-forty and Vergil hasn’t shown up yet. Maybe I shoulda given him more detailed directions- ‘downtown’ could be just about anywhere, after all. Eh, he’ll find it eventually.</p><p>Right as I think that, a portal opens in the alleyway next to me and a certain half demon walks out of it.</p><p>“Apologies for the wait,” he says while flicking blood off his coat. “There were some complications.”</p><p>Yep, sounds about right. “It’s all good. Now c’mon, let’s go to the card machine.”</p><p>He stops in confusion. “They use cards, now?”</p><p>Hoo boy, he really doesn’t know. “Yeah, you just kinda,” I start while pulling out a twenty. “Y’just put money in the machine and a card comes out. A lot of arcades use these nowadays.”</p><p>By the look on his face, I can tell I’ve officially lost him. Oh boy, is the confusion on his face entertaining. But we gotta get a move-on. “Look, just grab your card so we can get going.”</p><p>I half expect him to pull out a handful of quarters, so color me surprised when he throws thirty dollars in the machine. Alright then, time to get this show on the road.</p><p>We start walking over to the main gaming section. There’s not many people in here right now and it’s relatively quiet. Y’wouldn’t expect that from an arcade like this. Maybe the employees got sick of hearing it and turned all the machines down.</p><p>“So, anything catching your eye?”</p><p>He looks around for a minute until his eyes stop at a certain section, so I turn around to look at it.</p><p>“Uhg, claw machines.” Great, he had to pick the most rigged thing imaginable. “I wouldn’t even bother with these. They stuff everything so far in there, it’s damn near impossible to… wait.”</p><p>We look at eachother with the exact same thought in our minds. Oh, this is genius.</p><p>So, as to be completely inconspicuous, he swipes his card and tries moving the claw toward the object. Of course the claw doesn’t pick it up, but this is Vergil we’re talking about. He spawns a couple small swords that squish the little stuffed shark he was going for and moves it to the ejection chute.</p><p>He grabs the shark and tosses it over to me. “That rat incident gave you ideas, huh?” I can’t help the maniacal cackle I let out.</p><p>“What can I say?” he says with a shrug. “Great minds think alike.”</p><p>I snort. “Whatever, dork.” Wait, what was that? I just saw something in the corner of my eye. If that’s what I think it is…</p><p>“Oh no way, they got laser tag here?” It’s been so long since I’ve played, this brings me back-</p><p>“‘Laser tag?’”</p><p>How does he not know about laser tag? Sure, he didn’t know that arcades were still a thing, but this is laser tag for Pete’s sake. “Oh no way, we’re playing this right now. C’mon.”</p><p>I grab his sleeve and start power walking over to the door with him. Y’know, playing laser tag with only two people isn’t exactly ideal, but we’re gonna have to live with that.</p><p>After buying a couple tickets for the two of us (R.I.P. wallet), we walk to our respective rooms to gear up. “Good luck. You’re gonna need it.”</p><p>“I-” I shut the door on him before he can say anything. Ooooooh, this is gonna be good. I’ll officially be able to say I beat a bonafide warrior in a fight.</p><p>And then the game starts.</p><p>Immediately I dart behind cover. Alright, just gotta find him. Up wait- what’s that I see? A tuft of white hair sticking over the top of a barricade? For once, his height will be his enemy.</p><p>I creep over to him as sneakily as possible. Once I get behind his cover, there’s no saving him. Too easy. So I round the corner. He’s right there! All I gotta do is line the shot, and-</p><p>Suddenly, a barrage of swords starts barreling toward me.</p><p>“Woah woah woah, wait-!” All I can do is slam my eyes shut in anticipation.</p><p>Only, they never make impact. I open my eyes to find that not only am I still very alive, but the swords are sitting in the air right in front of me.</p><p>beep beep</p><p>“I win.”</p><p>“Aw no way, that’s not fair!” Did he really just do that? I can’t believe this. “You almost cut my head off, man!”</p><p>He says something between his cackles. “I don’t recall there being any rules against it. Though maybe you simply forgot to notify me.”</p><p>“You know what I mean, asshole.” I can’t help but laugh as well. He’s never done something so petty, and all to win a game he’s never played. What a massive dork.</p><p>Walking out of the laser tag room greets us with the rhythm game section. Oh, now this I’m curious about.</p><p>“Ey, Vergil. Would you say you have good reflexes?”</p><p>“Without a doubt,” he says right on beat. Wow, way to toot your own horn. “What’s the occasion?”</p><p>“Y’ever heard of DDR?”</p><p>I spend the next couple of minutes explaining the logistics of dancing games. Just step on the arrow that shows up on screen. It takes him a hot second, but it seems like he’s got the idea. Now to test it out.</p><p>We each go to a different dance pad. Now I’ve gotta say, my reflexes are on par with an armadillo, so I shoot for normal. Vergil decides to go on hard mode to see what’ll happen. Welp, his funeral.</p><p>And then the game starts.</p><p>I picked some random song to start us off. Every now and then I misstep, but I’m not doing too shabby if I do say so myself. When I look at Vergil’s screen, though, I see a mirriade of ‘Great!’s and ‘Perfect!’s. He hasn’t missed a single note.</p><p>And sure enough by the end, he winds up with a nearly perfect score. Huh, now I’m really curious.</p><p>“Alright, you’ve got the basics,” I say while stepping off the dance pad. “Now try going into MAX mode.”</p><p>I set the difficulty for him and let him pick the song. It’s a remix to some orchestral song I’ve never heard. There’s no way he can actually win here, is there?</p><p>But then the song starts.</p><p>Shocked doesn’t begin to describe how I feel- I’m completely flabbergasted. He’s just moving seamlessly, never missing a single beat, completely in the zone. How is he doing that? No, literally how is he doing this?</p><p>The song finishes and lo and behold, he gets a perfect score. I can’t believe my eyes.</p><p>But then the leaderboard message pops up. “I- how- Y’got the high score, dude!” I didn’t think he had it in him. “Input your name!”</p><p>“As if there was any doubt.” Ah, ever the showboat. “Although, uh-”</p><p>And just like that, the confidence dissipates. I chuckle under my breath. “I’ll input it for ya.”</p><p>After a few more minutes of idling about, we run out of money on the cards. Guess it's time to leave, then. That’s disappointing.</p><p>As we walk outside, I realize just how dark it’s gotten. We really just spent the whole day here, huh?</p><p>“That was fun, Verge,” I say while leaning on my car. “We should do this again sometime.”</p><p>“I agree. Although, I’d prefer to go somewhere a little less hectic next time.”</p><p>Yeah, that makes sense. I’m honestly surprised he enjoyed the arcade as much as he did. “Remind me to take you to dinner next time, then.”</p><p>I barely catch the surprised look on his face before I open my car door. “See ya around, Vergil.”</p><p>“... until then.”</p><p>And then I’m off. Man, today sure has been something. Wonder where I’m gonna put the little shark thing. And I still can’t believe he almost decapitated me just for a game of laser tag. Man, what a day.</p><p>What a day.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. I still can't get over the fact that people are like... enjoying this??? It makes me so happy but sometimes it's hard to beleive lmao. Anyway that's enough outta me, take care everyone! &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Falling... and Falling... and Falling...</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Moral of the story: stay away from high edges.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Alright, so I brought this up in passing to a friend earlier, but I couldn't stop thinking about being stuck in a bottomless hole with Vergil. Thus, this chapter exists.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>So apparently, if you go far enough outside the city limits, there’s a giant hole in the ground.</p><p>Y’see, the past couple attempts to walk through the park didn’t end up as planned. I figured a change in scenery couldn’t hurt. There’s a neat little walking trail and everything, I wasn’t expecting much. But for some reason, in the middle of the trail, there’s a trench so deep I can’t see the bottom.</p><p>Out of curiosity, I throw a rock in it and listen. It’s been around a minute and a half and it still hasn’t made a noise. Man, this thing is deep. And there’s these really weird markings next to it. They kinda look like little claw marks, but I can’t tell what they’re from. Oh, well.</p><p>Wait, what’s that? There’s some words spelled out in the dirt next to it. The dirt here is really light and crusty, so I’ll have to crouch next to them to read what it says.</p><p>“Beware of the bottomless-” I get rudely interrupted when something shoves me, causing me to lose my footing and fall into it. Uh oh. “-pit-!”</p><p>Well, shoot.</p><p>Whatever just pushed me down here is cackling now. I say ‘whatever’ and not ‘whoever’ because it is doesn’t sound very human- this is a demon hole, isn’t it? Did I fall right into a gateway to Hell? Just my luck.</p><p>At least I’ve got my phone. Being as careful as possible not to drop it and lose it to the infinite void of nothingness, I pull it out of my pocket.</p><p>Alright, I’ve gotta call Vergil. I mean really, what can the police do about this? Drop a rope? Exactly, this is my only option.</p><p>So I call.</p><p>Someone answers on the second ring. “Devil May Cry,” they say while eating. Dante.</p><p>“Hey, there,” I reply. You’d think it’d be hard to hear down here, what with the whole ‘constantly falling’ thing, but it’s actually quiet. Deafeningly quiet. “Y’mind putting Vergil on the phone?”</p><p>After that, he pulls the phone away from his ear and yells something. There’s some shuffling on the line before Vergil picks up. “Hello.”</p><p>“‘Ey, Vergil. What’s up?” I probably shouldn’t be this casual considering the circumstances. But this pit is bottomless, right? We’ve got time, then.</p><p>“I’m doing fine,” he says. “Why are you calling?”</p><p>“Well,” I start. Hm, how do I put this lightly? “I may or may not be falling to my doom.”</p><p>There’s a pause. “I beg your pardon?”</p><p>“Alright, so basically I was walking a little bit outside of city limits. Change of scenery and all that, y’know? Well I found this giant hole in the ground that may or may not be bottomless, I’m not really sure yet.” Guess I’ll know when I hit the bottom. But hopefully that won’t happen, right? “So long story short, I can’t get out.”</p><p>He sputters for a second. “Where are you?”</p><p>“Outside of Red Grave somewhere?” Curse my location blindness. Knew I shoulda learned the cardinal directions. “I’m not really sure. Uh but, yeah. Please help.”</p><p>His phone drops. Now I can’t see what’s going on in their shop right now, but I think some sorta Hell just broke loose. Vergil starts shouting something, after which I hear a door slam in the distance. Then someone picks up the phone again.</p><p>“He’s on his way,” Dante says, completely undisturbed. Welp, glad that one of us isn’t panicking.</p><p>“Cool. Um, I’m gonna hang up now.”</p><p>“Yeah, that’s fair.” And then I do.</p><p>Welp, looks like I got some time to kill. Hey, this is almost like one of those zero gravity chambers. Wonder if I can- oop, yeah, I totally can. Doing flips in the air is as good as any way to pass the time. I might be falling to my possible death, but I’ll be damned if I don’t do it in style.</p><p>So if this really is a bottomless hole, there must be some weird demon magic in it. Why would they even make a hole that never ends? Maybe there is an end and I’m gonna get sacrificed. Anyone’s guess is as good as mine.</p><p>How long have I been falling? The light at the top is pretty hard to see, now. Everything in here is super dim, it’s like staring straight into the void.</p><p>The dimness isn’t helped when a dark silhouette covers the top. Well great, now I can see even less than before. As it gets closer, though, I notice the sides of the hole are glowing. The figure itself is emitting some sorta light… a blue light.</p><p>Oh boy, am I glad to see him.</p><p>I expect him to grab me and fly back up right away. Instead, though, he undoes his demon form and crosses his arms. Uh oh, he’s mad.</p><p>“Hey, there,” I try to lighten the mood. “You come here often?”</p><p>Well, that didn’t work. He’s looking at me with a sourpuss frown on his face, visibly annoyed. “How did you even get here?”</p><p>“Hey, it’s not like I dived right in.” The nerve of this guy. “A demon shoved me.”</p><p>“Oh, I can tell,” he says, not any less annoyed. “What I’m wondering is how you didn’t. Did you not notice the ritual in progress on the surface?”</p><p>Oh I swear, if he starts blaming me… “They weren’t there when I got here. Honestly, I don’t know how you can blame me for this.” We’re just bickering like an old married couple, jeez.</p><p>“Well what I’m wondering is-”</p><p>And just like that, we get into a heated debate. How was I supposed to know demons could create giant craters in the middle of nowhere? It’s not my fault that a certain someone didn’t tell me.</p><p>“Whose first instinct is it to stand and wait by a seemingly endless abyss, anyhow?”</p><p>“Gee, have you never been curious in your life? I swear, if you don’t-”</p><p>Our argument is cut off by a loud thump noise. Was that the rock I threw in here earlier?</p><p>Have we been falling to our deaths this whole time?</p><p>So we panic.</p><p>I start waving my arms around like a chicken with its head cut off. What else am I supposed to do? “Shit dude, get us out of here!”</p><p>Vergil freaks for a second and starts flying. I almost shout at him that hey, you forgot someone down here, before something blue and glowy manifests next to me. Oh, I’ve never been so happy to see Doppel.</p><p>We’ve been plummeting for a while, so the trek back up is gonna be pretty long. But man, am I glad to not be falling anymore. I might just kiss the ground when I get back up there.</p><p>It takes a few minutes, but we finally return to the surface. Judging by the looks of it, he took care of the demons before jumping down there. That’s a relief.</p><p>Words can’t describe how happy I am to be back. I never wanna be at the mercy of gravity again, that was the worst. And kinda boring, too- things only got interesting when Snotty Ms. Complains a Lot showed up. Well regardless, I’m glad to have my feet touching the ground again.</p><p>There’s only one problem with that.</p><p>“Uh, Vergil?” He is turned around, so he hasn't noticed what's going on. But when he does, he damn near combusts.</p><p>Y’know, I’m glad Doppel brought me back up and all, but it just decided not to let go. It’s just cradling me in its arms, looking all too pleased to have me here. But it’s not just that, it kinda feels like it’s… well, clinging. Like it’s worried about something.</p><p>Even after Vergil collects his thoughts, he still doesn’t know what to do. “W-Doppelgänger, stop.” He takes a step forward, it takes a step back. “Drop.”</p><p>“Woah woah woah, ‘drop?’” I don’t want this thing to drop me, I’ll go down like a sack of potatoes.</p><p>Well aside from that, he doesn’t know what to do. Doppel doesn’t look like it’s letting go anytime soon. Guess it’s up to me.</p><p>“Uh,” I start patting its head awkwardly. “I’m good, buddy. Y’got me.”</p><p>Eventually, it starts loosening its grip on me. It puts me back on the ground, and thank goodness- I can finally feel the ground again! Uhg finally, never going near another crater again. No way.</p><p>In the middle of my excitement, Vergil despawns Doppel. Man, you’d think that he’d have a better hold on the thing, what with it being a ‘physical manifestation of his mind,’ and all that-</p><p>Wait. ‘Physical manifestation of his mind.’ So the fact that Doppel was so concerned and didn’t want to let go means…</p><p>Aw, no wonder he’s so embarrassed about it.</p><p>But I won’t dwell on it for his sake. “What’re ya planning to do about the hole?”</p><p>He snaps out of his embarrassment and looks back at the hole, mostly composed. “The demons are gone, so it should even itself out in time.”</p><p>That’s awfully cryptic, but I don’t feel like asking any further. Hopefully no unsuspecting bikers take this road anytime soon.</p><p>“Well thanks for that, Vergil.” I yawn before continuing. “I’d invite you to finish my walk with me, but I’ve had just about enough of the outdoors today. I’m going home.”</p><p>He turns into his demon form before responding. “Would you like to be flown home?”</p><p>He’s offering me a ride? Well alright, I know I just went on about never wanting my feet to leave the ground again, but-</p><p>“You bet your ass I would.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. Funny story, I write all these chapters in one sitting. I started on a different chapter earlier but after thinking of this, I closed that doc and started this one instead. So yeah, I hope you liked it lmao</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Hey, I Can See My House from Here</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Somtimes, y'just need a fall guy.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Wow, back to back chapters? Yup, I thought of the idea for this earlier at work and I thought I'd go ahead and write it. So yeah, enjoy~</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Yup, we’re flying alright.</p><p>It’s gotten significantly darker since earlier. How long were we arguing in the hole, anyway? I’m not sure, in all honesty. What I am sure of, though, is that flying is really, really cool.</p><p>When he offered to fly me home, I probably shoulda considered how high we’d be going- we’re nearly touching the clouds right now. At least the air isn’t thinning up there. Y’know how when you get high enough in airplanes, your ears start popping? Man that’s the worst, it’ll suck if it happens up here-</p><p>“Tell me,” Vergil says out of the blue. Oh yeah, I almost forgot he’s here. “What possessed you to take a leisurely stroll in the middle of December?”</p><p>“Have you felt the weather today?” It’s like sixty degrees out here, that’s way better than usual. “I wasn't gonna pass this up.”</p><p>He does a weird half sigh, half chuckle, but doesn’t say anything after that. We’re flying kinda slowly right now. Well okay, it isn’t slow, but it’s not as breakneck as I thought it’d be. It’s actually pretty peaceful.</p><p>Hey look, there’s the store.</p><p>I try to point it out before remembering that, oh yeah, he’s carrying me by the elbows. I’m like a coat on a hanger. Except instead of a hanger, it’s Vergil. And instead of a coat, it’s… me… okay, this analogy doesn’t make much sense.</p><p>Actually, my elbows are getting pretty sore. “Hey, y’mind if I just-?”</p><p>He stops moving forward as I start climbing him. I feel like a monkey hanging off of weird demonic monkey bars. It’s clumsy and there’s a few ‘oh, sorry, whoops’s in there in there, but eventually I reach his back. His spine is kinda spiky, though, so I gotta sit at a weird angle.</p><p>“Alright. Proceed.”</p><p>He rolls his glowy demon eyes before moving. I’ll let the sass slide just this once.</p><p>Man, his whole body is pointy. Why does he need so many sharp edges in his devil form, anyway? Not just that, but I gotta steer clear of the horn fire. I wonder if he can turn it off on command.</p><p>Eh, couldn’t hurt to ask. “Hey, I got a question.”</p><p>“I have an answer.”</p><p>Great. “Can you maybe stop spewing fire outta your horns? I’d rather not be turned into human jerky.”</p><p>He tsks. “Well maybe you shouldn’t have climbed on my back, then.”</p><p>The audacity. “Whatever, just turn it off.”</p><p>Once again, he rolls his eyes before taming the fire. Huh, so he can turn it off. What else can his demon form do, I wonder?</p><p>Before I ask, though, I wanna do something stupid.</p><p>To his absolute befuddlement, I try to stand up. Now that the fire’s gone, I can use his horns as makeshift handle bars. This is so undeniably stupid, but I can’t help it. This is for science.</p><p>Finding my footing is a little tricky, but I manage to stand on my own. Against the wind and more impressively against my better judgement, I’m doing it.</p><p>I’m skateboarding on a demon.</p><p>A crazy amount of adrenaline fills my system. I’ve never felt so alive! Man, what would my coworkers think if they saw me up here? If only they knew.</p><p>Through my hysterical laughter, a voice chimes in. “As much as I’m sure you’re having fun up there, I’ll have to ask you to sit down.”</p><p>“Or what?” I’m probably pushing my luck here, but I’m on some sorta high right now. “You can’t do anything about it. I’m untouchable, baby!”</p><p>He tries to stick his arms behind him in vain. There’s no way he’ll be able to grab me while flying, I really am untouchable.</p><p>“Aw, is little Vergie trying to drop me?” I can’t help but taunt him. Getting under his skin is too much fun, and especially right now? C’mon. “Are your wings too big for your little itty bitty arms to get by-?”</p><p>I’m swiftly interrupted when something wraps around my midsection. Wait, is this his tail-?</p><p>“Woah-!”</p><p>Just like that, I get flung into the air a few feet above him. For just a few moments, I’m floating in the evening sky on my own. It’s beautiful.</p><p>And then I’m falling again. Quite ungracefully, might I add.</p><p>Before I can stray too far away, I’m caught by a certain smug half demon. Well, this sucks. I instinctively cross my arms while Vergil holds the hood of my sweatshirt.</p><p>“What, you don’t want me to hold you with my ‘little itty bitty arms?’” Screw this guy, using my own words against me. “Because I can drop you again, if so desired.”</p><p>What an ass. “You’re no fun.” I try to stop a grin from taking over my face. “Although…“</p><p>“Hm?”</p><p>“... I wouldn’t mind being thrown again.”</p><p>Even with his demonic face, I can still see the pointy smile he shoots me. Then the fun starts.</p><p>We spend the next few minutes whooping and hollering as he tosses me up just to catch me again. It’s surprisingly fun to get juggled like this- being hurled up, falling for a few seconds only to be snatched is too entertaining. I’m having way too much fun right now, and I can tell he is too. For as much as he tries to hide it, he can’t cover up his happiness. Not from me, at least. I mean c’mon, would any unhappy person do loop-de-loops midair?</p><p>As I dangle from one of his hands, a thought pops in my head. “Y’know, this reminds me of a movie I saw a while back.”</p><p>“Oh?”</p><p>“Yeah,” I start. “It’s about this one guy who becomes friends with a dragon. He kinda starts like, taming it? But it’s not really taming, they’re kinda becoming friends- look, it’s hard to explain, we should watch it sometime.”</p><p>He considers it. “We should.”</p><p>He hoists me up on his back, and we continue flying to my house. The next few minutes are spent in relative silence. But it’s not an uncomfortable silence or anything, it’s pretty calm. Serene, I’d even say.</p><p>I’m not sure how much time passes, but we eventually make it back to my place. I’m gonna be honest, I’m a little upset it didn’t last longer. Regardless, I hop off him and onto my lawn, and he shrivels back into a human. “Thanks for the ride, dude.”</p><p>“Anytime.”</p><p>I open the door and lean out for a second. “And thanks for the help earlier. I owe ya, buddy.”</p><p>He sighs. “Don’t mention it,” he says. Awfully charitable of him, eh?</p><p>“Alright, take care of yourself, man.”</p><p>“You as well,” he says with a wave. Then I shut the door, and that’s that.</p><p>Man, that was a trip. I’m still kinda surprised he even offered to fly me here. I’m glad he did, though- that sure as hell beat walking. At least the day ended up alright, what with the catastrophe that was the hole. If I’ve learned one thing from today, though, it’s this:</p><p>Never go free falling without a friend.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And yeah, there ya go. I'm gonna be real with ya, I had a big 'ol stupid smile on my face while writing this one. I hope you guys like it. :]</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Paintball Without the T</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Can we teach a demon to play paintball? Let's find out.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Alright, we've got another long chapter. I didn't mean to make it this long but that's just the way the cookie crumbles, sometimes. Hope ya enjoy this one :]</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Okay, this is gonna be interesting.</p><p>Y’see, there’s this promotional competition going on for a local paintballing company. Now that’s all fine and dandy- I’m not too crazy about paintball, really, so it didn’t catch my eye- but here’s the thing: the winners get ten thousand dollars. Ten thousand dollars! Y’know what I can do with that much money?... well, not much in this economy, but still.</p><p>Now, this is a partner competition, so I had to drag someone along with me. It took a bit of negotiation, but I eventually convinced someone to tag along. Granted, he probably doesn’t know anything about paintball, but he’s got that intimidation quality to him. Anyone coming in for a sneak attack’ll probably go running to their mommies-</p><p>“Remind me why we’re here again?”</p><p>Speak of the devil (literally). “Uhg, finally. I’ve been waiting for you, Ve-”</p><p>W… what is he wearing?</p><p>When I turned around to greet him, in no world did I expect to see this. He looks like he’s heading straight into a warzone- are those night vision goggles? Where did he even find those?</p><p>I snort involuntarily. But c’mon, how can I not? He looks ridiculous.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>I can’t take it anymore. A few people turn to look at me while I laugh like a maniac. Oh man, I can’t breathe!</p><p>“What’s so funny?” He sounds genuinely upset.</p><p>“Oh man, Verge-” I wipe a tear from my eye. “What’s with the fit?”</p><p>He has the gall to look down at himself completely unfazed. “I read that this was the needed equipment for the occasion.”</p><p>“Where’d you read that, some fifty year old paintball manual? Here, let me just-” I step behind him and grab that bulky looking jacket he’s got on. What is this, thirty pounds? Regardless, I throw it on the bench next to us. “Alright one more thing. Come down here for a sec.”</p><p>He leans down far enough for me to grab the goggles. There’s so many fassens on this thing, jeez. After unclipping the whole thing, I throw it on the jacket.</p><p>“Good thing they have more of these.” I grab one of the complementary pairs of hunting goggles from the ref booth and snap them on his face. He groans and rubs the bridge of his nose. Oops, maybe I shoulda been more careful about that. Oh well.</p><p>“Well well well, who do we have here?”</p><p>This must be the world record for the fastest Vergil’s ever scowled. He stands back up and crosses his arms. “And just what are you doing here, little brother?”</p><p>So y’know how I came here just for the money? Yeah, turns out Dante had the same idea. And he’s got a friend with him- some black haired woman I’ve never seen. She’s got heterochromia, though, and I’m a little jealous. Wish I had differently colored eyes…</p><p>“You think I’d pass up an opportunity to make free money?” Dante lifts a hand to his forehead in fake surprise. “You wound me so.”</p><p>Vergil sneers. “Unfortunately for you, brother, our team will reign victorious.”</p><p>“In your dreams.”</p><p>Yuh oh, this is a pretty intense staredown going on. I feel kinda awkward here. While that’s going on, I reach a hand out to the woman next to Dante. “Good luck.”</p><p>She smiles and gives me a firm handshake. “Likewise.” Y’see, is it that hard to not have a petty rivalry? These two should take notes.</p><p>One of the supervisors blows a whistle, so it’s time to get going. “May the best team win,” Dante sing songs while walking to his position.</p><p>“We intend to,” Vergil says back. The amount of salt radiating off of him is nuts, but not unsurprising. Something tells me he’s gonna take this a little more seriously, now.</p><p>I don’t know whether to be excited or terrified.</p><p>Then the supervisor starts explaining the rules. Y’get twenty minutes to run in the forest. After that, it’s a free for all- you get hit, you’re out. Sounds easy enough. Winning’s the hard part. But I’ve got Vergil with me, so I’m feeling pretty good on our chances.</p><p>Then the whistle blows. Alright, it’s go time.</p><p>A few minutes of running in, we’re out of sight from just about anyone else. Okay, strategy time. “Alright, Vergil, I’ve got an idea.”</p><p>He keeps walking but cocks his head in acknowledgement. Good.</p><p>“I wantcha to fly above the trees and see where everyone else is. Give us the ‘ol bird’s eye view, y’know?” This plan is foolproof- no one’ll ever catch us off guard and hell, maybe we can even rain paint on some suckers. They’ll never know what hit ‘em-</p><p>“Now that, I can’t do.”</p><p>Wait, what?</p><p>“What’s that supposed to mean?” Oh no, no no no, the whole plan’ll fall apart. “Dude- Vergil, if we wanna secure the victory, we’ll have to-”</p><p>“Had this been any other occasion,” he cuts me off. “I wouldn’t be opposed to the idea. Now, however,” he glares at the tree in front of him. “This is personal.”</p><p>Of course. He has to pick now, of all times, to have this beef with Dante. Go figure. But y’know what? We still got a fighting chance. This is fine.</p><p>Doesn’t mean I won’t be upset by it, though. “Have it your way. But if someone gives us the jump, it’s on you.”</p><p>He nods his head. Good, then we agree. Well at least if this falls through, second place gets a couple gift cards to this neat little burger joint. Sure, it’s a little greasy over there, but money is money-</p><p>A siren goes off. It’s been twenty minutes already?</p><p>I can’t dwell on it for long. “Alright, Vergil. It’s game time.” I crouch behind a tree. “Now, we wait.”</p><p>“We wait?”</p><p>Maybe I shoulda explained the meta to him before the competition. “Paintball is all about patience, my friend.” How can I put this in a way he’ll understand? Oh wait, I’ve got it. “Think of it like a hunter stalking their prey.”</p><p>He lets out a little ‘oh’ before crouching next to me. Cool, he got the jist of it. Then the real game can begin.</p><p>…</p><p>Around half an hour later, we start getting antsy.</p><p>Where is everybody? “Someone shoulda come through here by now…”</p><p>Something rustles in the bush next to us. Finally, some action.</p><p>I peek my head above the bush to see what’s up. Vergil does as well, but he’s a little too tall so his head is sticking above it. I push it down a little bit to not give us away.</p><p>There’s two dudes walking on a path parallel to ours. We’ve got a clear shot of both of ‘em, now we just gotta line it up.</p><p>“I’ll take the guy on the left, you take the one on the right. We’ll shoot on the count of three,” I whisper to Vergil. He nods and aims his gun. It’s now or never.</p><p>One…</p><p>Two…</p><p>Three!</p><p>In a second flat, my guy’s got an orange splat mark right in his stomach. Heh, can’t help being a great shot. It’s a good thing we got a good shot on the two of them, that was too-</p><p>Wait, he missed.</p><p>I panic and shoot the guy on the right before he can lift his paint gun. Whoo, that was a close call. As they grumble and walk away, I turn to Vergil. “What was that?”</p><p>He shrugs. “I’m not accustomed to using guns.”</p><p>“Y’don’t say?” I shouldn’t be this upset right now, but my frustration’s getting a hold of me. “Where was that lack of skill back in laser tag, huh?”</p><p>“That isn’t a fair comparison and you know it,” he says, equally as angry. Oh, he’s got the nerve to be mad at me over this?</p><p>“My point stands. We had a clear shot of ‘em and you flubbed it up.” I throw my hands up in frustration. “How could you miss? They were three feet in front of us!”</p><p>He tsks and throws his head to the side. “I don’t need to take this-” A twig snaps.</p><p>My eyes dart up. There’s a partnerless person in front of us with a barrel pointed right at Vergil. “Oh shit- heads up-!”</p><p>I instinctively step in front of him and pull my gun on her. She pulls the trigger.</p><p>Well, there’s good news and bad news. The good news is that I shot her right in the arm. As minor as it may be, she’s out.</p><p>The bad news is that I’ve got green paint all over my chest. What’s worse, the force of the shot knocks me straight off my feet and into the tree next to us. Maybe I shoulda had more protective gear, after all.</p><p>Vergil instantly kneels down next to me. He doesn’t say anything for a while, but he looks shocked. Well, this didn’t go as planned.</p><p>I overdramatically stick out my hand to him. “Vergil…” He takes the hand apprehensively as I continue my monologue. “You need to keep going… for both of our sakes…” I shoot him an intentionally painful looking smile. “Win this for me… wouldja?”</p><p>The concerned look he just had quickly turns into confusion. “Are the theatrics really necessary?”</p><p>Uh oh, he’s not playing along. “... well-”</p><p>“You act as if you’re actually dying-”</p><p>“Look, whatever, just go and win already.” There’s no point if he won’t even humor me.</p><p>He pauses for a second then rolls his eyes. “I won’t let you down.”</p><p>“You’d better not,” I call out as he starts walking away. “I’m rootin’ for ya.”</p><p>We’re screwed.</p><p>Welp, better get back to the start area. I wipe the snow off my pants- did they need to do this in February?- and walk back to the rest of the fallen contestants.</p><p>It’s only been a little less than an hour, but half of the teams are already out. It’s a good thing I put his stuff on the bench, otherwise I’d have to sit in the snow.</p><p>Huh, looks like they’ve got cameras in there. They set up a huge projection screen while we were out, so we’re watching the remaining players go at it. Welp, it’s a good thing he didn’t start flying. Might as well sit here and watch.</p><p>Then some time passes. I get hungry at some point so I grab a pretzel. Oh sick, they’ve got cheesy pretzels? I’ll grab one for Vergil, he can eat it later. If only the line wasn’t so long.</p><p>Eventually, I get back to the bench. Jeez that only took what, fifty years? Whatever, wonder what’s going o-</p><p>There’s a single camera taking up the whole screen. Wait, is that Dante?</p><p>So it turns out while I was gone, every team except for Dante’s and Vergil were knocked out. He actually got us to second, huh? I didn’t think he had it in ‘em.</p><p>Oop, sounds like they’re smack talking each other. Now this, I’ve gotta hear.</p><p>“... heard your buddy got knocked out earlier, Verge,” Dante starts. “What a shame. Woulda loved to crush both of your dreams right here.” Looks like he’s got a flare for the dramatics, too.</p><p>The camera’s at a kinda weird angle so I can’t see his face, but Vergil shifts his stance ever so slightly. “My partner’s sacrifice will not be in vain.” Jeez, that’s a bit intense. Where was that energy when I was outed? “Let’s finish this.”</p><p>Thus begins the stand-off. The tension in the air here is so thick- feels like the whole audience is holding their breath. C’mon, Vergil! I didn’t believe in you before, but you made it this far…</p><p>Someone shoots.</p><p>It takes us all a minute to figure out who did it, but when we get a better look at it, the results are clear. The light blue paint on Dante’s stomach is evidence enough.</p><p>Vergil actually did it.</p><p>The audience goes wild. And that includes me, by the way- we just won! Ten thousand dollars, baby, here I-!</p><p>There’s another gunshot.</p><p>Vergil jerks up in shock and feels behind his back. Sure enough, there’s a giant purple stain lining the whole thing.</p><p>The woman steps into frame, sniper-paint gun in hand. “Gotcha.”</p><p>…</p><p>Well, that’s disappointing.</p><p>A few minutes later, Vergil and I walk back from the ref booth with the giftcards. I should probably be more upset right now, but like I said: money is money.</p><p>That’s not the only reason, though. “Y’did good out there, Vergil.” I’d give him a pat on the back, but I’d rather not stain my hand purple.</p><p>He sighs in disappointment. “I let my guard down.”</p><p>“Yeah, but you did good.” No way am I gonna let him talk shit about himself after that. “You basically carried the team, dude. Don’t sweat it.”</p><p>I lift up my card. “And hey, it wasn’t a total loss. We still got these.” Sure, they’re not ten thousand dollars, but beggars can’t be choosers. “Actually, I’m free for the rest of the day. Wanna get some cheap burgers?”</p><p>He chuckles lightly. “After we wash the paint out?”</p><p>“After we wash the paint out.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there ya go. Thought I'd give a little nugget of information here- you might've noticed that I've never given the reader pronouns. Personally I go by she/they, but I try to set it up so that the reader's name and pronouns are never brought up. You're allowed to interpret the reader as you will. Anyway, have a good one everyone!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Cat's Outta the Bag</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>What's in the box?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>What, uploading at a reasonable hour? I was honestly planning on posting this later tonight, but I'm bored in school right now so eh, why not?</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>April showers.</p><p>Finally, a storm I can predict. The weather here in Red Grave is all over the place, but at least there’s one universal here: it’s always rainy in April. And boy, is it pouring right now. Sure, it’s not a flash flood or anything, but it’s going pretty hard. Luckily I came prepared- I got this cool rain-proof jacket the other day. Works like a charm.</p><p>Of course I’d rather not be out in the rain in the first place, but I had a few errands to run. Y’see, one of the managers put down the wrong shipping address for this week’s supply of rubber ducks (I don’t know why, either), and for some reason, I had to tag along as they sorted it out. Sometimes that’s how the cookie crumbles</p><p>Thankfully that’s over now, though, so I can spend the rest of the day chillin’ on my couch. Can’t wait to take a load off, my legs’re killing me-</p><p>What was that?</p><p>I’m pretty sure I just heard something. Shoot, which way did it come from- wait, there’s another. It’s on my right somewhere.</p><p>I do a once over up the road to make sure I’m not missing something, then head a little ways into the alley. In just a few feet, I find a pretty sizable looking box. Sounds like the noises are coming from here.</p><p>Alright, maybe opening a suspiciously large box in the middle of an alleyway isn’t a very bright idea. Still, though, my curiosity is piqued. A small peek couldn’t hurt, right? I crack it open just a little.</p><p>Opening the box greets me with a myriad of tiny black and white kittens.</p><p>Who left a box of cats in the middle of an alleyway? And not just that, but how many are there- one, two, three- that’s what, seven? Poor little guys, the owner must’ve kicked them out. What an asshole.</p><p>I can’t just leave them in the rain like this. But on the other hand, how am I gonna keep them all dry? This box is damp enough as it is, there’s no way I’ll be able to keep them safe without…</p><p>I know what I gotta do. Curse you, empathy.</p><p>Sucking up my pride, I take my rain-proof jacket and throw it over the box. The little guys start meowing incessantly, probably cause I just blocked out the sky. I’ll get you guys outta here soon enough, don’t even worry about it.</p><p>I grunt a little while picking up the box, then I’m on my way. Yeesh, these guys are light. When’s the last time they ate? Hope it wasn’t too long ago.</p><p>A few minutes into my trek back, I walk down a familiar street. Hey, isn’t this the road to Vergil’s place?</p><p>I look up at a building a little ahead of me and sure enough, there it is. ‘Devil May Cry.’ I don’t wanna stay out in the rain for too long, so hopefully he doesn’t mind me taking a quick pitstop.</p><p>I reach the doorstep, then stop to think. Am I supposed to knock first? People usually do prefer a warning before waltzing on in, after all. But this is a shop, right? Walking in seems appropriate enough.</p><p>Alright, that’s settled. I put the box down next to me and grab the handle. Hopefully I’m not barging in on anything.</p><p>Dante suddenly wakes up from a nap. “Wh-huh, I’m awake.”</p><p>“Sorry to bother ya,” I say while standing on the doormat. My shoes are way too wet right now- wouldn’t wanna track water in their house or anything. “Is Vergil here?”</p><p>Dante nods. “Yeah, just give ‘im a sec.” Dante turns his head to the stairs and shouts for him. “Vergil, it’s your friend! Getchur ass out here!” Then he throws a magazine over his eyes and continues his nap. How professional.</p><p>After about a minute and a half, a certain someone teleports right in front of me. Is it weird that I’ve become desensitized to teleporting?</p><p>Something I’m not desensitized to, though, is rain. And he can tell. “What are you doing here? You’re completely drenched.”</p><p>“Oh, y’don’t say?” Look at Captain Obvious over here. The shivering was probably a dead giveaway.</p><p>He’s got that look in his eyes again. Y’know, the classic indecisive, ‘weighing my options’ face. Eventually, though, he sighs and takes off his coat. “Here.”</p><p>“I’m good, dude.” I’d feel kinda bad if I got his jacket all wet.</p><p>But he insists. “Just use it for the time being, lest you wish to shake like a leaf in the wind.”</p><p>Snide remarks aside, I can’t argue with that. I take his coat and throw it over my shoulders. Holy moly, this thing’s huge. Not as heavy as it looks, though.</p><p>Then he notices the box sitting next to my feet. “You have a jacket with you yet decided not to wear it?”</p><p>“Nah man, let me explain.” Oh boy, he’s gonna get a kick outta this one. “I found something… important on the side of the road. Had to keep it dry ‘till I got home.”</p><p>He tsks and crouches down next to it. “What could be so important that you needed to-?”</p><p>He shuts up pretty quickly when he sees what’s inside.</p><p>“Exactly,” I say while kneeling next to him. “No idea where they came from. Gotta get the little dudes to my place to get ‘em fed and dry, then I’m takin’ ‘em to the vet.” I reach out to grab the box. “Speaking of, I’d better get going now-”</p><p>He picks up the box before I can. “I’ll be joining you.” Oh, well that was unexpected. Not unwelcomed or anything, just unexpected. “If for no other reason than to get my coat back.”</p><p>Right, that’s why he’s coming with. Totally. “Whatever you say.”</p><p>“Now then,” he says while shifting the box to his other arm. He summons another weaponized umbrella in his other hand and pushes the door open. “Let’s get going.”</p><p>Thus begins our journey to my house. It’s kinda impressive how he can hold both an umbrella and a litter of kittens at the same time, but I gotta wonder why he didn’t just make me hold one of them. Eh, makes my life easier. Might as well not question it.</p><p>Eventually, we reach my doorstep. “Appreciate the heavy lifting, Vergil.” I hold out my hands to take the box.</p><p>He doesn’t move it towards or away. Uh, am I missing something?</p><p>After a little awkward silence, he finally speaks up. “I thought I could, er, assist you in cleaning them.” He coughs into his fist, awkwardly. “It would be more efficient, that way.”</p><p>He wants to help? That seems out of character for him. Since when does he care about animals? Unless…</p><p>No way. “Are you a cat person?”</p><p>His back stiffens as he tries to deny it. “No, I just- it would increase productivity,” he explains frantically.</p><p>“You’re totally a cat person! Aw man, that’s adorable-”</p><p>“Whatever.” And just like that, he’s defensively holding the box up to himself. An effective, if not less intimidating, way to express annoyance. “Am I allowed inside or not?”</p><p>I step outta the way. “Be my guest.” He walks inside, box in tow. “You go ahead and get started, I’m changing my shirt.” The thing’s practically sticking to me at this point.</p><p>After I get changed, we really get to work. First thing’s first: we gotta check the little dudes for injuries. None of them look particularly hurt, but one of them is having a hard time walking. Better keep an eye on that one, I’ll name it Broccoli for now.</p><p>Alright, now we gotta clean them off. I’m not 100% sure on the best cat-cleaning methods, but a damp towel certainly wouldn’t hurt. And not with dirty rain water, I’m talking actually clean tap water. We give ‘em the ‘ol rub down, and one of them looks particularly pleased by it. I’ll call it Knuckles.</p><p>Okay, what’s next? I must be missing something. If I was a cat, what would I want…?</p><p>“Cat food,” I half yell while facepalming. Duh. “We forgot to get cat food. Hang on, I’ll be back in a few minutes.”</p><p>Vergil shoots me a confused look. “You’re leaving me in your house alone?”</p><p>“You prolly wouldn’t know what to look for, and someone’s gotta keep an eye on the little guys,” I say while grabbing my keys. “And I trust you. Don’t burn down the house while I’m gone, alright?”</p><p>I shut the door before I get a response. Now to get the goods…</p><p>… around a half hour later, I get back to my house with the food. It took a little longer than I thought it would, I had a hard time picking which brand to get.</p><p>Regardless, I unlock the door and step inside. “Sorry for the wait, Vergil. I didn’t know if they like dry food or wet food, so I grabbed one of each-”</p><p>… okay, now this I wasn’t expecting to see today.</p><p>Picture this: Vergil- bitter, spiteful Vergil- sitting on my couch with five kittens sleeping peacefully on his lap. Wait, weren’t there seven of- oh, there’s Knuckles right there, playing with the ribbon on the end of Yamato. Broccoli is sitting on Vergil’s shoulder like a damn parakeet. He stops mid-pet as soon as I walk in.</p><p>Neither of us say anything. We’d be able to hear a pin drop, the silence is so deafening. The look on his face right now is indescribable- it’s like a mixture of horrified and embarrassed, sprinkled in with something I can’t even recognize.</p><p>“...”</p><p>“Not a word.”</p><p>“Holy shit, Vergil-”</p><p>“Don’t you dare say it-”</p><p>“This is the cutest shit I’ve ever seen.”</p><p>He groans and pinches the bridge of his nose. I get the feeling he’d run away, had there not been an army of cats sleeping on his legs. I wanna laugh so hard, but the thought of waking them up and ruining the scene would be criminal.</p><p>But they gotta wake up regardless. I start shaking the bag of dry food to get their attention. “Alright, little guys, time for you to get something in your system.”</p><p>I pull some random tupperware from the cabinet since all the bowls are too big for them to get over. Unfortunately, I over calculate how fast the food’ll spill and end up getting it all over the floor anyway. Oh well, that’s what vacuums are for.</p><p>All of them jump down and start eating in random locations. Well except for Broccoli, who Vergil has to pick up and plop on the floor himself. Wait, does that mean he put Broccoli on his shoulder in the first place? That just makes it more hilarious.</p><p>And adorable.</p><p>This time, I can’t find it in me to not poke fun at him for it. “I shoulda known you’re a cat person.” C’mon, he totally gives off cat owner vibes. How could I not see that one coming?</p><p>His eyes squint. Yup, I’m pushing his buttons. “You’re free to assume what you will.” A total deflection.</p><p>“That’s not- hey!” Oh jeez, Knuckles started beating up one of the other cats. I pick it up and move it to the other side of the food pile. “No fighting, Knuckles.”</p><p>“You named it Knuckles?”</p><p>He’s looking at me with a somewhat baffled expression. Is he really judging me for my naming conventions? “What, you have something better?”</p><p>“Of course I do,” he says with all the confidence in the world. “And Bakeneko agrees.”</p><p>“Bake- huh?” Is he for real? Alright, now I’ve got a point to prove. I pick the little dude up and hold it near my face. “That name sucks. Isn’t that right, Knuckles?”</p><p>He squints his eyes. “Its name is Bakeneko.”</p><p>“Knuckles.”</p><p>“Bakeneko.”</p><p>“Knuckles.”</p><p>“Bakeneko.”</p><p>“Knuckles!”</p><p>The little dude starts squirming in my grip. Oops, it must wanna go back to eating. I put it back on the ground as Vergil crosses his arms. “Bakeneko.” This guy’s gonna be the death of me, I swear.</p><p>Eventually, once all the little dudes are nice and fed, it’s time to take ‘em to a vet. From there, they can take them to an animal shelter of some kind. Somewhere they’ll be safe. That means it’s time to kiss them goodbye.</p><p>“I’m gonna miss you, Broccoli,” I say while giving it a little scratch. Vergil gives me a weird look in my periphery but doesn’t say anything.</p><p>He pets Ba-Knuckles’ head as I close the box, and that’s that.</p><p>“Thanks for the help, Vergil,” I say in the door frame. Huh, kinda feels like I’m forgetting something…</p><p>Oh yeah, duh. His coat. It’s probably dry by now, yeah? “Were you planning on taking that back?”</p><p>He looks at the coat rack and shrugs. “I’ve no need for it.”</p><p>Before I can ask what that’s supposed to mean, he summons a completely identical coat right onto his body. He can just do that? Actually y’know what, this isn’t that surprising all things considered.</p><p>Wait, so this means his jacket is made of some weird demon magic. So technically, it’s made of demons.</p><p>…</p><p>I called it.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Y'know when ya think about it, Vergil's kinda like a cat. Except instead of claws he's got a giant katana, and instead of cute fluffy fur he's got horrifying demon scales and spikes. So yeah pretty similar to a cat. Anyway, have a good one everybody.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. What Does the V Stand for?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Wanna see a magic trick?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Happy twentieith chapter, everyone! I'm surprised I we got this far, haha. Here's a bit of a special one for the occasion.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Well, this is annoying.</p><p>My phone’s stuck behind the stove all alone, with no way of escaping. Of course I tried to get it out- believe me, I did- but had to give up after a couple hours. Why does the slot between the wall and stove have to be so narrow, anyway?</p><p>In any case, now I’m stuck at work without it. It’s hard not to notice that familiar weight missing from my pocket.</p><p>Someone comes up to the counter in the middle of my sulking. Great, customers. Just what I want to deal with right now.</p><p>As they start putting things on the belt, I realize who I’m dealing with. “You look awfully chipper.”</p><p>“Never better,” I say, visibly annoyed. It’s hard to return Vergil’s usual snark when I’m this irritated. “Bumped my phone behind the stove yesterday. Can’t get it out.”</p><p>It’s only after saying this that I realize that oh yeah, this is Vergil. He’s basically the king of grabbing things out of reach.</p><p>And he knows it, too. He chuckles a little under his breath. “I’ll be over later.”</p><p>“You’re a lifesaver, man.” Praise be that he decided to go shopping today, it would be a lost cause without him.</p><p>…</p><p>He shows up to my house around seven-thirty. In that time, I tried grabbing it again without much luck. Really, I tried everything- grabbing it with pseudo back scratcher chopsticks, moving the stove (wow, did that one go poorly)- it was kinda sad, actually. Thank all that is good and holy that he’s here.</p><p>Only, there’s another problem: that opening is really, really narrow. “How did you even drop it down here?”</p><p>“Look, man, I wasn’t paying much attention and it just fell off.” I don’t have a good excuse for why this happened. I was just minding my own business, doing a little dance while salting my food, then bam! There goes my phone. “Can’t you just, y’know, use your little summon swords-”</p><p>“Mirage blades.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, whatever- mirage blades and pick it up?”</p><p>He tsks and scratches his chin. “That’s what I was intending to do, but this gap is far too narrow.” Then there's a funny look in his eye. Uh oh.</p><p>Before doing whatever he’s about to do, he turns to me with a somewhat serious expression. “You may want to take a step back,” he says while pulling out Yamato.</p><p>Well that’s an awfully cryptic message. “What’s that supposed to-”</p><p>Without any further explanation, he stabs himself straight in the heart.</p><p>Holy shit- what the- why- huh? Why?!</p><p>“Dude, Vergil- what are you-?”</p><p>There’s a giant flash of light so blinding, I have to put my arm in front of my eyes. What’s going on?</p><p>After a few seconds passes, I check to see if the air has cleared. Okay, everything looks normal again. But shit, is he alright? I uncover my eyes to see what’s happening and-</p><p>Um.</p><p>Okay, so y’know how Vergil was in here just now? Y’know- really tall, white hair, constantly looking like he wants to fight the sun and could probably win? That guy?</p><p>Yeah, this ain’t him.</p><p>There’s a weird looking goth guy standing in his place wearing sandals, of all things. He’s still got a funky looking trenchcoat- does everyone in Red Grave have such a weird taste in fashion?- and tattoos all over the place. I can’t even tell what they’re supposed to be of, though. Did he just scribble them on?</p><p>But that’s not it. He’s got a funky looking cane, too. And he’s so boney- is he okay? Looks like he would fall over if I so much as poked him, this guy.</p><p>Wait, what’s that noise? Turning my head just a little to the left greets me with a giant bird flying around. “Boy, does it feel good to stretch my wings again!” And it can talk, apparently. Noted.</p><p>When it’s done flying, it lands on a panther near my feet. This guy’s got the whole circus with him, I swear. But the panther doesn’t talk, unlike the bird. Also noted.</p><p>In the middle of my confusion, the guy strolls on over to the stove, sticks his cane in the slot and pulls it out like it was no biggy. Then he holds it out in front of me. “Here.”</p><p>The silence that falls over us is ear-splitting. What am I even supposed to say about this? And why’s he being so casual? This guy really just appeared in my kitchen and went about his business as if nothing just happened. Just… how?</p><p>“Yuh oh. Looks like y’lost ‘em, V,” the bird says while I sit there bug eyed. ‘Lost’ doesn’t even begin to describe it- I’m outright bewildered.</p><p>The guy sighs. “It appears so.” He reaches into his jacket for something and pulls out a book. “‘If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to-’”</p><p>“Hold on, hold on, hold on,” I cut him off. Oh, no way is some random stranger gonna appear in my kitchen and start reading off poetry. “Don’t talk in limericks, just tell me what’s going on. Actually, no, let’s start with this: who the hell are you?”</p><p>This guy has the gall to sigh dejectedly as he closes the book. “I have no name,” he starts. “I am but two days old.”</p><p>Alright, now he’s messing with me. I’m this close to kicking him straight outta the house.</p><p>Before the guy has a chance to say anything else, the bird starts talking. “Don’t mind him, toots. The guy’s a walking Blake mouthpiece.” Can’t believe the bird’s being more sensible than this dude.</p><p>The bird flies over to his shoulder before continuing. “Whatchur lookin’ at, right here, is Vergil’s inner humanity brought to life! This includes yours truly, of course.”</p><p>“Humanity brought to life?” This is hard to wrap my head around. “So let me get this straight: his humanity is of some skinny emo- no offense-, a wise cracking bird and a panther? Is there anything else I’m missing here?”</p><p>It’s only then that I feel the ground shake around me. I turn my head to look out the back door and see a giant, goopy golem looking thing with a giant eye in the middle. Of course, cause that makes this less confusing.</p><p>At least it didn’t spawn in my house.</p><p>“Regardless,” the emo guy says while putting my phone on the counter. “I suppose this is as good a time as ever for introductions. You may call me V.”</p><p>“V?” Wow, real original name, Vergil. I wonder what V could possibly stand for…</p><p>But this has me curious. “So if you’re his human side, what about the demon half?” You’d think he woulda brought that one up at some point.</p><p>V twirls his cane a bit while sighing. “That side of him is a bit unstable, you see.”</p><p>“Yeah! Last time he brought it out, you betchur ass things didn’t go so well,” the bird interrupts. “It’d raise a tonna Hell if he brought that guy out. I mean really, these two’d have to be on just the right wavelength to make that happen!” Okay, I guess that makes sense.</p><p>“Speaking of unstable,” V says while holding up his hand. Is he flaking? “It seems our time here is coming to a close.”</p><p>Ah, he’s on a time limit. “Welp, as confusing as that was, it was nice meeting you.” Is it really meeting though? I mean he’s a part of Vergil, I don’t really know if that counts.</p><p>“Oh, the pleasure’s all ours, baby,” the bird says. He flies up to the counter next to me while nudging my arm with his wing. “We’ve taken quite the liking for ye, if ya haven’t noticed.”</p><p>“I’d sure hope so,” I say while shrugging. “I’ve only known Vergil for what, a couple years now?”</p><p>“Welp, in any case, we’d better get going.” The bird is flaking, too. “Catch ya on the flip side!”</p><p>Once again, V sighs while his skin keeps crumbling. “Until then…” And then he’s gone. If only we had more time, I still had some questions for them.</p><p>At least Vergil’s back.</p><p>“Vergil, buddy,” I say while leaning on the counter. “You gotta give me some type of warning, next time.”</p><p>“I asked you to take a step back, did I not?”</p><p>Oh, this smug bastard. “Yeah, cause that totally prepared me for watching you stab yourself.” I groan while picking up my phone. “At least he got it back for me.”</p><p>“Hm,” is all he says while the cane reverts back to Yamato… hey, wait a second.</p><p>“Are you able to do that on command?”</p><p>Instead of answering, he switches Yamato back and forth between itself and the cane. So in that case…</p><p>“Why’d you even stab yourself if you could change it into the cane, anyway?”</p><p>He still doesn’t answer. What would possess him to just-</p><p>“You just wanted to confuse me, didn’t you?”</p><p>Even with his head shifted to the side, I pick up the tiny smirk he has on his face. Eventually that smirk turns into a very poorly hidden smile.</p><p>“You asshole, that’s totally what you just did!” He just wanted an excuse to do that in front of me, didn’t he? What a dork.</p><p>He can’t hold it back after I say that. He lets out a soft snort before cackling. What an absolute bastard, thinking he can pull the wool over my eyes. And it almost worked, too.</p><p>“Whatever, man. Get outta here before I kick you out.” That’s only a half joke, though- you can’t just pull a stunt like that and expect me not to kick you out.</p><p>“Alright, alright,” he says defensively while walking towards the door. “You’re welcome, by the way.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Thanks a lot, ‘V.’” Seriously, what a dumb name. “And don’t let the door hitcha on the way out.” He’s still cackling to himself when he leaves.</p><p>Well, that was a lot to process. Okay, so Vergil has a human and a demon side that can be made manifest if he stabs himself. And the demon part is so unstable that it might wreck a few weekends, apparently, but the human side is just an emo guy and his army of pets. That’s what just happened.</p><p>…</p><p>I’m taking a nap.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the chapter. Like I said, I never thought I'd make it this far. Originally, this whole thing was gonna be a one-off chapter I wrote after a crappy day of work. I wasn't even planning on sharing it. I didn't think I'd continue it, let alone get this far. Thanks again everyone, and have a good one!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. After Hours</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>'Demons don't need sleep,' my ass.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, guys. I wrote this one cause I worked pretty late last night. Some guy came into the drive-thru without pants on, you can't make this stuff up. But that's neither here nor there, here's a chapter.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Only ten minutes until my shift ends.</p><p>I don’t even know why they brought me in so late. Why are we even open 24/7? Hardly anyone shows up around this time, so it’s not like we’d be making much anyway.</p><p>But no, they just had to drag me in here for the midnight shift. I really don’t appreciate having to stay up ‘till two-thirty in the morning, but here we are. At least it’s finally past ‘23- only a few minutes to go. So help me, if they ask me to stay longer I might just-</p><p>Ah, an order. It’s so vacant here, I swear I can count how many orders we’ve gotten the past couple hours on my hands. And none of them have been big, either. Case in point: this sad sap just ordered a single black coffee. Yeesh, who would need to stay awake past two-thirty? I almost feel bad for-</p><p>“Vergil?”</p><p>I wasn’t expecting him to pull up, of all people. We’re both looking at each other like we saw someone committing a crime. What the hell is he doing here this late? “You’re up early.”</p><p>“I could say the same to you.” He leans forward on his motorcycle and shoves his cheek in his hand. Huh, he looks tired too.</p><p>“Well,” I start while counting his money. “Gotta make ends meet, somehow.” I’d rather not be here to begin with, but hey: hours are hours. Demonic fruit made of human blood apparently grows on trees, but money doesn’t.</p><p>He yawns loudly and lets out a small ‘hm.’ Yup, he’s tired alright. I think the only thing keeping him up is the cool air outside. Believe it or not, even in July, the nights here are always pretty chilly. I think it’s also like that in the desert. It’s got something to do with the low humidity or something…</p><p>What am I doing again? Right, my job. Am I really that loopy right now?</p><p>I throw his money in the register and go to hand him his change. Huh. Now that I’m getting a better look at him, he looks worse than tired. He looks… exhausted? Drained, maybe. I’m not really sure, but it’s not a good look for him. I don’t know how far he can make it back to his place.</p><p>But on the other hand…</p><p>“You look beat, dude,” I say while leaning forward on the counter. “I dunno if you can make it back to your joint in one piece, buddy. Wanna crash at mine for the night?”</p><p>A few seconds pass and he doesn’t say anything. I’m not even sure if he heard me, actually. “Vergil.” Yuh oh, he totally zoned out. Gotta bring him back to reality somehow. What would be enough to scare him? “Public affection!”</p><p>“Eh?” He snaps his eyes open and looks up at me. Yup, that’ll do it.</p><p>I sigh and repeat the offer. “What, you didn’t hear me? Or could you say it just didn’t…” I motion forward to the cash register sitting in front of me. “... register?”</p><p>It takes him a second to process that. Once he does, though, he immediately groans and rubs his eyes. “That was horrible…”</p><p>“That was funny! C’mon, you liked it.” Will anyone ever appreciate my sense of humor?</p><p>I don’t get a response for that. He just rolls his eyes and starts up the bike again. “I’ll be there when your shift ends.”</p><p>“Which is in about forty seconds.” Talking to him really passed the time. Now I just gotta wait for the manager to give me the go ahead, then I’m off. “And don’t forget to pull up to the next window and grab your coffee. Wouldn’t wanna spend a dollar eighty for nothing.”</p><p>He looks forward again in surprise. “Oh, right.” That was supposed to be a joke- did he actually forget? Oh man, can’t wait to jab at him for- oh, he already left. Bummer.</p><p>Welp, at least I’ll get to make fun of him later.</p><p>…</p><p>I finally get back to my place at around a quarter to three. Uhg. Another day, another dollar I guess.</p><p>I’m glad Vergil didn’t park in my driveway. That woulda been annoying as all hell. I’d have to park on the street, but then I wouldn’t be in my usual spot. Or I’d have to drive around the bike, but that’s such a tight fit, and there’s no guarantee I’d even-</p><p>I’m overthinking this. It’ll be better after I get a good night’s sleep.</p><p>I walk up to the door to find him waiting outside it. Huh, that’s a little weird. “Why didn’t you just teleport in?”</p><p>“It’d be unwise to use any unnecessary energy in this state,” he says while motioning at himself. “And regardless, would that not be an invasion of privacy?”</p><p>Fair point. I unlock the door and let us both inside. Immediately upon walking in, I move over to the couch and take my shoes off. Oh boy, does it feel nice to let these dogs breathe. He moves to sit next to me and takes a sip of his coffee.</p><p>“How long’re ya trying to stay up, anyway?” Honestly, he couldn’t pick a worse time to grab a coffee even if he wanted to.</p><p>He lowers the cup a little. “Unlike humans, I don’t require as much sleep to make do.”</p><p>“Uh huh, yeah. Explain this.” What a crock of bullshit. How can he say that while nearly forgetting his entire order in the same breath? “And you didn’t answer the question- how long’ve you been awake?”</p><p>“... a week.”</p><p>A what? That’s gotta be a joke. There’s no way he hasn’t gotten any sleep in a whole week.</p><p>“Okay,” I say while standing up. Nope, we’re not doing this right now. “I have a lot of questions, but I’m gonna save them for later. What you’re gonna do is march straight to my bed and get some much needed shut-eye. And I’m not talking about some sort of light nap- I’m talking a good eight hours, at least.”</p><p>He looks at me, a little startled. “That isn’t necessary-”</p><p>“Nope, I don’t wanna hear it.” Does he really think he can admit to not sleeping in a whole week and argue with me over it? No way. “Just get up and go to my room. It’s down the hall, first room on the left- you can’t miss it.” I pick up the small blanket on the other chair and plop it down next to him. “I’ve got the couch.”</p><p>Now he looks extra surprised. And a little guilty, I think? “Shouldn’t I take the couch?”</p><p>My eyes couldn’t roll harder if they tried. “Don’t argue with me, man. Just go get some sleep.”</p><p>He hesitates for a second before standing up. His hand moves to grab his coffee so I smack it. “And don’t bring the coffee.” I’m not trying to be rude, but he’s gotta work with me here.</p><p>Eventually, he lumbers on down the hall and into my room. Finally. The guy needs to get some sleep, seriously. And so do I.</p><p>Alright, Mr. Sandman. Do your work.</p><p>…</p><p>Uhg, is it morning already?</p><p>I glance over to the clock I got on the wall and squint at it. 10:29 A.M. Yup, sounds about right. Okay, time to start the day then. Wait, am I on the couch? What am I…</p><p>Oh, yeah. Vergil.</p><p>After standing up and stretching, I walk down the hall to check-up on him. Wonder if he woke up already.</p><p>Creaking the door open greets me with a very asleep Vergil. You’d expect someone as stoic as him to be a little more dignified as they sleep. But nope, he’s sprawled out on my bed like a damn starfish. Something tells me he doesn’t usually sleep like this, though- he must’ve really been wiped.</p><p>Hey, there’s something else next to him. I move a little closer to see what it is, only to be met with Yamato. Did he seriously tuck in his sword before going to sleep? I can’t tell whether that’s funny or concerning. Oh well, it’s none of my business. Might as well leave him be.</p><p>As soon as I shut the door, my stomach growls. Huh. Guess it’s time to eat, then.</p><p>But I don’t feel like cooking anything. Usually I just grab a snack and call it a day, but it’d be rude to leave Vergil breakfastless.</p><p>Hope he doesn’t mind take-out.</p><p>I write a note saying where I’m going and put it on the table next to the couch. Oh yeah, his coffee’s still sitting here. Gross.</p><p>I dump it out and grab my keys. Does any place around here give good breakfast food? Eh, I’ll figure it out on the way.</p><p>In the end, I grab something from this one pancake house I’ve never heard of. But hey, the sign said ‘Best Pancakes and Waffles You’ll Ever Eat!’ What was I supposed to do?</p><p>It takes a little longer than expected, but I get back to my place with the pancakes in tow. Oh boy, these smell good. I wasn’t sure which type to get, so I grabbed a few types. These blueberry ones smell incredible.</p><p>Fumbling with my keys for a second, I unlock the door and step inside. Believe it or not, it’s kinda hard to unlock the door while holding stacks of pancakes.</p><p>“Welcome back.”</p><p>Oh good, he’s awake. Right on time. He’s sitting on the couch, note in hand. Looks like he just woke up a few minutes ago.</p><p>“G’morning, Sleeping Beauty,” I say while kicking the door shut. I hobble over to the couch and plop the take-out boxes on the table. “Hope y’like pancakes.”</p><p>He looks content with it. Alright, so he doesn’t dislike pancakes. I made a good call, then. Then he sniffs the air. “Chocolate chip?”</p><p>“Bingo,” I say while picking up one of the boxes. “And chocolate syrup to go along with it. Y’want ‘em?”</p><p>He gets this weirdly sentimental look on his face while grabbing the box. “My mother used to make these…”</p><p>Ah, that explains it. Might as well leave him to it, then. I grab the blueberry box and start chowing down.</p><p>We sit here in silence for a few minutes. Aw man, these sure hit the spot. Can’t believe I’ve never heard of that place before, these pancakes really are good.</p><p>After a while, I break the silence. “Why were you up for a whole week, if you don’t mind me asking?”</p><p>He closes the box before saying anything. “I don’t know.” He’s lying through his teeth right now, it’s so obvious.</p><p>“It’s Dante, isn’t it?”</p><p>He scratches the back of his head. “That’s not the only reason. It…” He stops to think. “... it’s hard to explain.”</p><p>Well, that’s awfully descriptive. But I can’t force him to say anything. “It’s cool if you don’t wanna talk about it.”</p><p>There’s another silence between us. Hm, I think I got too many pancakes. There’s nothing wrong with leftovers, I guess.</p><p>“Readjusting has been difficult.”</p><p>“Hm?” I ask midchew. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting him to say anything.</p><p>He sighs before elaborating. “When I said that I was ‘preoccupied,’ it was a little more complicated than that.” He leans his head on the back of the couch. “I was, er… stuck in Hell for a while.” Another sigh. “Around two decades, to be exact.”</p><p>Oh. That would explain a few things.</p><p>“So much has changed,” he continues. “It’s difficult not to think about how out of place I’ve become.” A small chuckle. “Though Dante certainly doesn’t help.”</p><p>That’s a lot to take in. So he’s been internalizing that this whole time, huh? No wonder he’s so out of tune with the world around him.</p><p>“That sounds rough, man,” is the best I can say. “It isn’t much, but if Dante’s ever giving ya shit or ya just need somewhere to crash for the night, I’m always here.” I pat his shoulder and give him a reassuring smile. “And I think you’re doing fine, for what it’s worth.”</p><p>His eyes widen a smidgen as he looks at me. That looks like… realization? Weird. I won’t question him, though.</p><p>It takes him a minute to collect his thoughts, but eventually he looks back down and sighs. “Thank you.”</p><p>“Anytime.” I stand up and grab the boxes. “You good to getchurself back home?”</p><p>“Of course.” Now, there’s the Vergil I know. A good night’s sleep’ll do wonders, I tell ya.</p><p>“Great,” I say once I put everything back in the fridge. “You got a few hours to spare?”</p><p>He quirks a brow at me but doesn’t move. “What did you have in mind?”</p><p>I plop down on the couch next to him and grab the remote. “Y’wanna watch some cheesy action movies?”</p><p>He rolls his eyes. “How tasteless…” He still doesn’t leave, though. Great.</p><p>“Hope y’don’t mind zombie flicks.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>There's the chapter. And uh oh, looks like someone realized he has feelings. Wonder what he'll do about it. Anyway, have a good one everyone. And remember to get on a good sleep schedule.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0022"><h2>22. It's All in the Wrist</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>To be fair, having a door closed on your arm really hurts.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Howdy, everyone. Sorry about the long wait, I've been dealing with some issues as of late. I'm gonna proof read this later lmao.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I broke my wrist.</p><p>Okay, that’s a little bit of an exaggeration- it’s just a little fracture. The doc said it’ll heal in a few weeks, so I’m not too worried about it. It’s kinda irritating, though- I’ve handled demons and death defying situations a handful of times, but having a door close on my arm too hard is what does me in. How underwhelming.</p><p>In any case, I’ve still gotta do my job. The managers didn’t cut me much slack for basically being down an arm. They gave me the day off to get the medical issues handled, then threw me right back into the frey. Coulda seen that one coming from a mile away. Oh well, money is money. I’ll live.</p><p>Still annoying, though.</p><p>At least customers have been a little more lenient with me. Most have asked if my arm’s okay, and a few asked to sign the cast. Having a ton of names next to those from my coworkers has made my arm pretty colorful, all things considered. And that’s about the extent of it.</p><p>Well, except for one person.</p><p>Someone walks into the lane with a pile of pizzas on the cart. I don’t even gotta look up to know who’s here.</p><p>“‘Ey, Vergil,” I greet him while waving. “How’s it hangin’?”</p><p>He stops lining his pizzas on the belt and looks up. Oh yeah, he doesn’t know. I almost forgot.</p><p>“What, this?” I say while pointing to the cast with my other hand. “Yeah, it happened the other day. Long story short, I went to this old fast food joint the other day. This one old lady tried to hold the door open for me- that’s sweet of her, right? Well it turns out she couldn’t keep her hold on it very long. Snapped right on my wrist here.” I chuckle. It’s kinda funny, in retrospect. “She screamed like she saw a ghost, I swear.”</p><p>That doesn’t get a laugh outta him. Oh well, not every quip’ll stick.</p><p>After a little while longer, he sighs and keeps putting his stuff on the belt. Alright, let’s get this line moving.</p><p>“Do you know how long the recovery process is?” Vergil asks while I start scanning his stuff. Yeesh, this is kinda hard to do single handed.</p><p>“They said it’d be a few weeks, so it’ll prolly get better by the end of October.” Well if I did the math right in my head, at least. Alright so it’s seven weeks and it’s August, eh… shoot, what day is it agai-</p><p>In the middle of my needless mental math, I instinctively try to grab a can of ravioli with my busted hand. The shooting pain that works up my arm is almost enough for me to audibly yelp.</p><p>All I let out is a wince as I grab my arm. I barely notice Vergil step forward in panic, one arm outstretched. “Nope,” I say to no one in particular. “Nope. I’m good.”</p><p>Uhg, I gotta be more careful. And great, now I got Vergil all worried. He steps back again but now he’s got this weird concerned look on his face. Gee, now I feel bad. The best I can do is try to play it off.</p><p>So I do. “That kinda stings, haha,” I say while shaking my hand a little. “Gotta watch out next time.”</p><p>He doesn’t look convinced. Actually, I think he looks even less convinced than before. Oops. But he doesn’t say anything. Shot in the dark guess here, but he probably doesn’t know what to say. I wonder if he’s ever gotten an injury like this, what with the whole ‘half-demon’ thing.</p><p>In the middle of me scanning a box of strawberries, he finally speaks up. “I’m willing to lend a helping hand, if necessary.”</p><p>“‘Helping hand?’” I repeat while bagging some of the groceries. “Kinda rude to make hand puns right now, y’know.”</p><p>He looks a little startled, at that. “Wait, that’s not what I-”</p><p>“I’m just messing with ya.” It’s so easy to poke fun at him, I can’t help myself. “I appreciate it.”</p><p>His arms cross. “Well now I’m not so sure I want to help you.”</p><p>Wait, is he for real? “Aw, c’mon. Don’t be like that-”</p><p>“I jest, of course,” he says with a chuckle. Did he just use my own trick against me? “I’ll aid you where I can.”</p><p>“It’s convenient you brought that up, actually,” I say while holding out my hand for his money. “I actually need to get groceries of my own later. If there’s any chance you can…” I hate asking for help from people like this, it makes me feel weird.</p><p>But he doesn’t look bothered. He grabs all his bags and smiles. “I’ll meet you here after your shift.”</p><p>“Appreciate it, buddy.” And then he’s off. It’s moments like these when I really appreciate having a friend like Vergil. I wonder how my life would be going if I didn’t know an unreasonably strong yet very awkward half-demon.</p><p>It’d be a lot less interesting, that’s for sure.</p><p>…</p><p>It sucks that I can’t drive for a while.</p><p>I mean yeah, I can drive single handedly, but Red Grave’s got this weirdly specific policy. 'If possible, two hands must be seated on the wheel at all times. This prohibits actions such as eating, drinking, smoking, detaching arm for shooting oncoming demons, etc.’ Wonder where that rule came from.</p><p>In any case, Vergil and I gotta walk the groceries back to my place.</p><p>Luckily I live alone, so there isn’t much to get in the first place. Still, though, I feel kinda bad for having Vergil carry most of my stuff. It’d be easier if we had another set of hands-</p><p>Wait a second.</p><p>“Hey,” I say while looking up and down the street. Okay, we’re in the clear. “Whaddaya think would take more work- lugging around all these groceries, or having someone else do it for you?”</p><p>It takes him a second to catch my drift, but he eventually sees what I’m getting at. He does another onceover of the road, then something manifests next to us.</p><p>Next thing we know, Doppel is carrying everything for us. Ah, my intellect is too grandiose for this world.</p><p>Vergil cackles under his breath. “Oh, what would we do without your innovative ideas?”</p><p>“It was good, dude,” I say while elbowing him. What an ass. “And I didn’t hear you come up with it first.”</p><p>“Yes, because walking seven blocks with a handful of groceries is such an arduous task.”</p><p>“It is for a little ‘ol human, buddy.”</p><p>“Clearly,” he says while motioning to my wrist. “Fragile creatures, you are.”</p><p>“Wow,” I hold up a hand to my chest while feigning offense. “I’m crushed. Crushed, Vergil.”</p><p>The next few minutes are spent with our continued sass as we walk back to my house. Keeping up with his snark comes so easily- it’s like second nature, at this point. And I’m pretty sure he feels the same. It’s usually easy to tell, actually- he’s become somewhat of an open book, now.</p><p>Around half an hour later, we get back to my place. Huh, that felt a lot shorter than I expected. Not that I’m complaining, though.</p><p>“Thanks again for the help, man,” I say while stepping up to the porch. Doppel despawns and resummons into my kitchen with the groceries intact… y’know, I don’t really know how that’s possible. I’m just not gonna question it.</p><p>Vergil only says a small ‘hm’ before reaching for Yamato. Hm… wait.</p><p>“Hold on, Vergil,” I say while opening my front door. “I’m gonna go grab something, wait right here.” He turns around in confusion and his hand falls back down to his side. Alright, gotta make this fast.</p><p>I book it inside to my coffee table and start rifling through things. Okay, where is it? I know I just had one of these earlier, it’s gotta be around here somewhere-</p><p>Found it.</p><p>Returning to the door, I toss it over to him. He catches it on instinct without seeing what it is. Once it’s in his hands, he finally looks down at it in confusion. “A marker?”</p><p>“You guessed it,” I say while holding out my cast. “Go ahead and sign it wherever.”</p><p>He looks at it, not any less confused. Oh. Guess he doesn’t understand this either, huh?</p><p>“Whenever someone breaks their arm or something, everyone signs their cast.” Now that I explain it out loud, it doesn’t make much sense. I wonder where this tradition started. “It’s supposed to help them know they’re not alone ‘n stuff.”</p><p>It still doesn’t look like he completely gets it, but he nods his head regardless. He holds up the underside of the cast while scribbling something on there, then lets it go once he’s finished. There’s a neat little ‘Vergil’ written near the right side of the cast. Nice.</p><p>“Hey, what are you-?”</p><p>Right when I hear that, something else runs up and starts writing something near the center of the cast. When it’s eventually done, I look down a little dazed at my arm to see a very sloppy but somewhat legible ‘DOPPEL’ scribbled on. Looking back up greets me with a very pleased looking Doppel. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Vergil shaking his head in the distance.</p><p>I can’t help but laugh. “Thanks, Doppel,” I say while reaching up and patting it on the arm. It hands me back the marker with a huge smile on its face, then makes its way back to Vergil. He pulls out Yamato.</p><p>“I’ll be going, then,” he says, way more flustered than he should be. It’s so like him to up and leave right when he gets too embarrassed.</p><p>“I’ll leave you to it, then,” I say while waving. “Hasta La Vista, Vergil. Until next time.”</p><p>“Until then.” Then a portal is cut into the fabric of reality, and that’s that.</p><p>I still can’t believe how much of a sentimental dork he is. Sure, he tries to pretend he’s this cool, aloof guy. And in a lot of ways, he is. But he’s also a massive geek who secretly wants to help people. Or maybe just help the people he cares about. Either way, he cares.</p><p>I know he does.</p><p>That doesn’t stop my wrist from being broken, though.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's that. I've honestly got a couple more chapters for the future planned out in my head. Here's to hoping I'll write them sometime soon, haha. Anyway, have a good one everyone. :]</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Remember Walkmans? Me Neither.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>You got games on your phone?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Alright, another chapter in bound. Hopefully Vergil'll be less of a boomer, someday.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Red Grave’s got a pretty cool subway system.</p><p>At least it’s more simple than a lot of other subways I’ve used. Y’know how they’re basically known for having super crowded and those over complicated maps that don’t actually explain anything? Yeah, it’s not like that here.</p><p>There’s barely anyone down here for some reason. I’m not really sure why, but judging by the giant purple vine stains and cracks on the wall, I’m guessing ‘demons’ isn’t out of the equation.</p><p>In any case, I’ve been taking the subway for a couple weeks now. I still can’t drive for the time being since, y’know, the broken wrist, so I decided to try out the subway system because ‘eh, why not?’ And I gotta hand it to ‘em, the guys who built this joint did a pretty good job. I’d almost call it peaceful down here- y’couldn’t judge someone for taking the subway just to get away from their problems for a while.</p><p>Of course I find Vergil doing just that, one day.</p><p>Well, it’s more like he finds me. I’m just chilling here on the subway seat, half paying attention to the song playing in my headphones. When the subway comes to a stop, I lazily look up at the people pouring in, but something catches my eye and makes me do a double take. Yup, that’s him alright.</p><p>He doesn’t notice me right away, though, so I wave my functioning arm at him. “Vergil.” His head peers up and he finally notices me. “Get over here, dude.”</p><p>It’s only when he’s standing in front of me talking that I remember I have my earbuds in. I pull one out. “Wanna run that by me again?”</p><p>He rolls his eyes. “Nevermind, it doesn’t matter,” he says while sitting down next to me. Huh, wonder what he was gonna say. Oh, well.</p><p>He peers over my shoulder to see my screen. I remember him mentioning how he’s never had his own phone, and that it’s probably gonna stay that way. ‘And just what would I need a touchscreen for? The most I’ve ever done is answer phone calls for Dante. I don’t need my own phone.’ Typical stubborn Vergil.</p><p>But that’s neither here nor there. “It’s just a song, dude,” I say while shaking the phone a little. For someone who’s so indifferent to modern tech, he sure is interested in what I’m listening to.</p><p>“I’ve heard these things can play music,” he says before mumbling to himself, “Nero showed me, once.” His kid, huh? Bet he probably tried and failed to convince his old man to buy a phone, too. “Can I…?”</p><p>I hold out the phone for him before he can finish his thought. “Be my guest.” Honestly, I’m a little curious to see what he’ll look up. It’s prolly gonna be some thousand year old symphony or something.</p><p>So he grabs the phone and holds it a couple inches away from his face. Wait, he’s not gonna- holy shit, he is.</p><p>I shoulda known he’d hold a phone like that. He’s doing that thing that elderly people do- y’know, where they hold a phone with one hand and type everything with their other pointer finger. How could I not see this coming?</p><p>I can’t even see what he’s typing anymore through the tears in my eyes. It’s getting so hard to hold back my laughter, because holy moly, how is this not hilarious?</p><p>After I let out a small snort, he side-eyes me. “What?”</p><p>That’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back. I start laughing quietly to myself to not draw any attention to us, and he chuckles a couple times nervously. “What’s so funny?”</p><p>“Nothin’, nothin’.” I won’t get on his case for this one. It’s not like he’d get the joke, anyway. “Whatcha lookin’ for, anyway?”</p><p>Looking at the search bar greets me with some uber Italian word I can’t pronounce. Yep, I was right on the money.</p><p>But I won’t deny him a listen. Uhg, that means I gotta share my headphones though. Annoyed, I start wiping off one of the buds and hold it to him.</p><p>He doesn’t grab it, though. “Can’t exactly listen to this without the bud, man.”</p><p>It’s only then that I remember how tall he is. Right, that’s a little bit of a problem, huh?</p><p>But a manageable one. I grab the collar of his coat and drag him to my eye level. Sure, he’s a little bit hunched over himself now, but this’ll have to do.</p><p>“Problem solved,” I say while putting the earbud in his hand myself. “Don’t shove that in your ears too hard, it’ll hurt your eardrums or something.”</p><p>“I know how earbuds work,” he grumbles, clearly offended.</p><p>“You didn’t even know arcades were still around- why should I assume you know how earbuds work?”</p><p>“You hold that against me even after a whole year?”</p><p>“Look whatever, man, I’m starting the song.” And I do just that: I press play.</p><p>Big mistake.</p><p>The song’s indecipherable because of how ear splittingly loud the volume is set to. How loud did I even have it before he showed up? It couldn’t have been this bad. Vergil practically jumps next to me while I panic and shut off my phone with my broken hand. Our eyes dart over to each other once the song isn’t playing anymore.</p><p>“...”</p><p>“... let’s just, uh, turn it down a little.”</p><p>“Let’s.”</p><p>After turning down the volume to a less ear shattering level, we give the song a listen. It takes about a half a minute of calm classical music playing at a reasonable volume for us to calm down, but my nerves chill out again. </p><p>He looks pretty content right now, too- just sitting there with his eyes closed, arms crossed, frown completely missing from his face. This music’s super boring, but I guess it’s worth it if Vergil likes it.</p><p>In the middle of the song, he asks me something I can’t quite make out. “Huh?”</p><p>“What?”</p><p>“Dude it’s too loud, I can’t hear you.”</p><p>“I said,” he takes the bud out. “What else are these ‘smartphones’ capable of?”</p><p>“Oh.” I pull out my earbud and close the app. “You shoulda just said so.”</p><p>Alright, what to show him first? I don’t know how much Nero showed him, so I might as well go with the basics. “Y’know these have cameras built in, right?”</p><p>“I know that much.” Okay, so he doesn’t completely live under a rock. Cool. “It triples as a radio, camera and alarm clock. And with access to the internet, I’ve heard.”</p><p>“Alright, then you already know the basics.” That saves me the explanation. So what else should I show him, then?</p><p>“What’s that?”</p><p>In the middle of my trying to think of something else to show him, he points to something on the screen. It’s an app with a cartoonish bird smack dab in the middle of it. Of course, why didn’t I think of this?</p><p>“That, my friend, is what we call a mobile game. Cause like, y’know, it’s a game on a mobile-”</p><p>“I could gleam that much-”</p><p>“Yeah whatever, just click on it.”</p><p>It takes a second for the game to load, but eventually the menu screen pops up. “Okay, so this one’s about a bunch of birds getting their eggs back from a group of pigs. Y’gotta catapult into them, so you gotta- hey you should probably click the ‘start button.’”</p><p>“Oh, right.” I hand him the phone and he tries to hold it hotdog style. I flip it horizontally in his hand, to which a small ‘oh’ is all he says.</p><p>And then he’s in. “Alright, you gotta catapult into them.”</p><p>“How?”</p><p>“Okay so- so y’kinda just…” Shoot, how do I explain this? Oh well, example’s the best teacher. “Y’just drag the catapult back and let go once you got the aim right.” I drag the bird with my own finger to show him what to do. “That make any sense?”</p><p>“I think,” he says in a way that implies it’s not making any sense. He does it exactly how I showed him with the next bird, but somehow misses the aim entirely and hits the ground. I don’t even know how he managed that one.</p><p>“Okay, lemme just-” I grab his hand and lead it to the screen for him. His whole arm tenses up as soon as I grab it, jeez. In any case, I lead his bird to where it needs to be then let go of his hand. “Alright just like that. Now let ‘er rip.”</p><p>Once he does, his little bird goes flying. Sure enough, it knocks right into the pigs’ tower and it comes crumbling down. “Now you’re getting the hang of it!”</p><p>“I don’t see the point in any of this,” he says. He doesn’t even sound annoyed or anything, just extremely confused.</p><p>I shrug. “There’s not really a point, dude. It’s just dumb fun.” I go back to the homescreen. “But hey, I got some others on here if y’wanna try them.”</p><p>He takes in his options before choosing one. “Oh, that’s one of my favorites. You gotta fight off a buncha zombies with these weird plant things.”</p><p>“Plants and zombies, birds and pigs.” He shakes his head and scoffs. “Who comes up with any of these?”</p><p>“Oh quit complaining, just start the game.”</p><p>We spend the next hour playing random games on my phone. Well, it’s less of us playing them and more of me explaining to Vergil how you’re supposed to play them. Some of the games stuck more than others- I think he said he liked the dragon hatching game? I dunno, it’s not like he’s gonna get a phone, anyway.</p><p>Eventually, though, the subway comes to my original stop. Huh, I must’ve completely forgot what I came here to do in the first place. Oh well, it’s not as if going to the soup store was that important, anyway.</p><p>Before I step off, though, I open the camera app. “‘Ey, Vergil, say cheese.”</p><p>I snap a picture with him and open it to see how it looks. I’ve got my middle finger pointing up through my cast at the camera. Vergil, though, clearly wasn’t ready for that- his mouth’s open like he was in the middle of saying something and he’s squinting.</p><p>“Not the best picture I’ve taken.” He sighs. “But not the worst, either.”</p><p>“It’ll have to do, then,” I say while walking to the door. “Catch ya on the flip side, Vergil.”</p><p>“See you then.” And then I’m gone.</p><p>I can’t believe how little he knows about modern technology. Well actually I can- he did say he was stuck in Hell for a while, yeah? It’s kinda bizarre to think about how much he’s missed out on. Hopefully he’ll be able to experience all the new things the world has to offer.</p><p>Hopefully he also gets better at video games.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. Hope you guys like it, I'm writing this at four in the morning. Can't even take my own advice on sleep schedules, huh? Well in any case, I hope y'like it. Until next time.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Everybody Wants to Rule the World</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>80's music is catchy, what can I say?</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. Hope you're having a good day/night. I bet you'll never guess what song I used here (sarcasm). Anyway, hope ya like this one.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Finally, I got this stupid cast off.</p><p>It took a little bit longer than they expected- a whole half a month, to be exact. Being down an arm until halfway through December isn’t how I planned on things going. But there’s no use crying over spilled milk- at least I can finally do things normally again.</p><p>That includes cleaning up a friend’s office.</p><p>Y’see, Vergil walked into the aisle one day with a few bottles of bleach and dust sweepers. When I asked what he needed them for, he told me that Dante would be out on a job for a few months and he was gonna clean the office in the meantime. I offered to help, of course, because I’ll take any opportunity to clown on the guy. </p><p>He begrudgingly let me join in on the stipulation that I couldn’t do any heavy lifting. I mean yeah, I did just come back from having a busted wrist. Makes sense.</p><p>So that’s why I’m outside their shop, again. Vergil told me to meet him here at a quarter to five. I’m still not sure whether or not I’m supposed to knock or not, honestly. Well if he’s expecting me it probably doesn’t matter. Whatever, I’m going in.</p><p>Huh. He’s not in the main part of the shop, right now.</p><p>Well that’s no good. Putting down the mop buckets, I make my way over to the stairs. “Y’here, dude? I brought sponges.” Before I take a step up, though, I notice how much white hair they’ve got on the floor.</p><p>Now I know those two have really light hair and all, but something tells me they don’t shed this much. Maybe it’s a side effect of being a half demon. Or maybe-</p><p>Something brushes up against my leg.</p><p>“W-Broccoli?” There’s a small cat down here with a little cat sized cast on. It’s still got a little limp, but it looks happy to see me. I can’t believe I’m seeing it again.</p><p>So did Vergil go out of his way to adapt Broccoli?</p><p>And that’s not all- there’s another small fluff ball sticking out from behind the desk. Aw it’s- shoot, what did he call it? “Bakeneko?”</p><p>“Knuckles,” Vergil says from the top of the stairs. Look who finally decided to show up. He descends the stairs and picks the little dude up.</p><p>Wait. “You kept the name?”</p><p>“The clinic wouldn’t allow a longer name,” he says without looking at me. Ah, he’s deflecting again. “This one had to do.”</p><p>The fact that he kept the name I gave it is… well, kinda touching. But still, I gotta make fun of him for it. “You’re just too stubborn to admit my name was better.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes, but doesn’t make any move to deny it. I’ll just assume I’m right, then.</p><p>“Regardless,” he starts while motioning to Broccoli. “We should move them out of the way before we start.”</p><p>“Good call.” I reach down to grab Broccoli, being very careful not to hurt its leg. Yep, buddy, I know. Casts suck. “It’s just these two, yeah? Please tell me you didn’t take the whole litter with ya.”</p><p>He scoffs. “Living with three hairy creatures is more than enough, thank you.”</p><p>That gets a genuine laugh outta me. Just like I’ll take any chance I can get to snark him, he’ll do just the same for Dante. “Alright, let’s get ‘em outta here and clean this place up.”</p><p>After putting them in some random room with a buncha squeaky toys, we finally get to work. First thing’s first, we gotta clear out all the dust and cat hair. Simple enough.</p><p>It’s around a half an hour into brooming when the boredom sets in.</p><p>We’ve barely said anything to each other after grabbing the brooms. The only sounds in here right now are from the brooms brushing against the floor. I know the guy works in silence, but this is getting irritating.</p><p>I lean on the desk. “You’ve been awfully quiet.”</p><p>He doesn’t look up from where he’s sweeping. “I have nothing to say.”</p><p>“Really? Y’got nothin’?” That doesn’t help in the boredom department.</p><p>“I don’t see why you decided to assist me if you were planning on complaining,” he says while finally looking up at me. He’s got one hand on his hip, the other on the handle of the broom. Looks like I managed to irritate him.</p><p>I roll my eyes. “Whatever floats your boat then, dude.” I look around the office for a second. “You at least got a radio or something?”</p><p>He rolls his eyes straight back at me and motions to the corner of the room. They’ve got this vintage jukebox collecting dust over there. But on top of it, there’s a slightly newer looking radio. I’m gonna guess it was given to them by a friend.</p><p>Once I’m right up to the radio, I stop and think. What kinda music would both of us like? He’s a total dork and listens to classical shit, and no way am I finding a station for that. I’m trying to keep myself entertained, not fall asleep.</p><p>Eventually, I choose some 80’s station. C’mon, everyone likes 80’s music. And that was basically his era, there’s no way he doesn’t know at least a few of these.</p><p>Alright, then, let’s get this show on the road.</p><p>Vergil doesn’t seem to have any reaction to the music playing, so I can only assume he tolerates it. And it’s making me feel a little better, at least. With a newly found spring in my step, it’s time to get back to work.</p><p>We manage to clear out all the dust and fur on the floor pretty quickly. Dusting off the walls goes by pretty quickly as well. Then there’s the ceiling fan. He tries to think of a way to get up there and dust it off before I mention that, news flash, you can fly. After becoming a demon and cleaning off the fan, we can finally get to mopping.</p><p>A few minutes into bleaching the floor, a familiar tune comes on. “Hey, I love this song,” I say while tapping my foot.</p><p>He doesn’t look up from what he’s doing. “Oh c’mon, Vergil. You’ve gotta know this one.” Everyone’s at least heard it once- there’s no way he doesn’t at least recognize it.</p><p>Still, no reaction. Oh well, that’s his loss.</p><p>We keep on mopping while the beginning of the song plays. Then it gets to the first words, and I can’t help but mumble along to them. It’s a catchy tune, can ya blame me?</p><p>Then the chorus kicks in and I can’t help but join in a little louder. “Acting on your best behavior, turn your back on mother nature…” I might be getting a little bit too into it- I start doing small dance moves around the mop and swiveling in the beat.</p><p>“It’s my own design,” the song continues and so do I. “It’s my own remorse…”</p><p>“Help me to decide,” another voice chimes in quietly behind me. It makes me do a double take and turn around to make sure I really heard that. Vergil’s certainly not as into the song as I am, but that was undeniably him. So he does know the song, after all!</p><p>And he keeps going. “Help me make the most of freedom and of pleasure,”</p><p>When I finally snap outta it, I take a step in beat with the song and join back in. “Nothing ever lasts forever,”</p><p>I reach him right at the end of the chorus, jump up and hook my arm around his shoulders. “Everybody wants to rule the world!”</p><p>The next couple of minutes consist of us jamming out while mopping up the floor. Like I said, Vergil isn’t as into it as I am, but he’s clearly enjoying himself. He’s doing this little shuffle thing as he cleans- it’s so hard to describe, but I’m not complaining. Seeing him this loosened up is so rare, I can’t take it for granted.</p><p>When the guitar solo near the end of the song picks up, I jump on Dante’s desk and use my mop as a makeshift air guitar. This probably looks ridiculous, but we’re both too wrapped up in the fun we’re having to really care.</p><p>Eventually the song ends, and we’re still chortling like a couple of idiots. I never thought I’d see the day where Vergil is damn near giggling, but here we are.</p><p>It doesn’t take very long for him to recover, though. “Great. You got bleach all over the desk,” he says in fake irritation.</p><p>“Oh, whatever,” I say while punching him in the arm. “I’ll get the sponge. We’re cleaning the place for a reason, yeah?”</p><p>He exhales quietly and shakes his head. “It’d be best to keep it clean, you know.”</p><p>“Oh, shut up. You had fun.”</p><p>The rest of the evening is definitely more interesting than before. We’ve still got the radio on, but now we’re actually talking again. We don’t talk about anything super important, but having these silly little conversations with him can be the highlight of my day, sometimes. </p><p>At some point, he accidentally steps in one of the mop buckets. After I laugh at him like an idiot for around half a minute, he decides to go to the back of the shop and change his shoes. When he comes back, though, he’s wearing sandals. Socks and sandals. When I laugh at him even harder than before, he opts to just summon a new pair of boots and call it a day.</p><p>Speaking of calling it a day, we get a good chunk of the place cleaned in around a few hours. Sure, we only got the lobby and the stairs, but it’s a good start.</p><p>Looking over at the clock on the wall greets me with ‘9:43 P.M.’ blaring bright red. Huh, it’s a little later than I thought it’d be. It’s just about time I get going, then.</p><p>“Alright, Vergil,” I say while standing up. We’ve been chilling here with Broccoli and Knuckles the past few minutes. “I’d better get back home. I’ve got work tomorrow, and I’ll be damned if I don’t get some shut-eye beforehand.”</p><p>He nods as I stand up. After picking up Broccoli and putting the little dude back on the couch, I make my way toward the door.</p><p>“I…”</p><p>“Hm?” I turn around to look at Vergil. He stood up from the couch as well, and made a half a step towards me. It looks like he’s got something on his mind. “You need something?”</p><p>“I… no,” he says while settling back on his heels. He thinks for a second before saying anything else. “This was… pleasant. Thank you for the company.”</p><p>His words are saying that’s all, but his face is telling me a completely different story. I won’t press it, though. “Anytime, dude.” I push the door open and step mostly out, but lean in for a second. “And you can keep the buckets. Y’might wanna save them for later. You really think this place is gonna stay clean for long?”</p><p>“You have a point,” he says while chuckling. “Three hairy beasts.”</p><p>“Exactly.” I glance back at him one more time before heading out. “Until next time, dude.”</p><p>“Until then.” Then I stop leaning on the door until it clicks shut behind me, and that’s that.</p><p>I still can’t believe he decided to keep Broccoli and Knuckles. Was he just embarrassed to bring them up and look like a big softy? Cause it’s true. He really is a big softy. A softy who secretly likes 80’s music, apparently. Either that, or he just wants to rule the world.</p><p>...</p><p>Nah, he probably just thinks it's catchy.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Alrighty, there's the chapter. I hope ya liked it, and that you stay tuned for the next one specifically. I'm not gonna hype it up or anything, but just wanted to mention that it's gonna be special. Until then, have a good one y'all.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0025"><h2>25. 'Your Reason' to be Here</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>A little message from the King of Hell.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. Like I said last time, this is gonna be a special chapter. I hope you all like it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Funny story, I just got kidnapped by demons.</p><p>Okay, that sounds bad out of context. I was just doing my job in the drive-thru when an inconspicuous lady drove up to the window. She ordered a couple boxes of chicken nuggets and fries- there wasn’t anything weird about it.</p><p>It was only after I stuck my arm out to hand her the food that a weird tendril stuck out of her chest. Her whole body morphed into some sort of weird spider creature with a human head. ‘Well, shit,’ was all I could say at the time.</p><p>Next thing I knew, my entire arm was covered with this sticky web thing as she hauled me out the window. Yeesh, I know it’s been a couple months since it’s healed, but I’d rather not have to wear a cast again.</p><p>Y’know, assuming I get outta here.</p><p>I’m not really sure what they’re planning, if I’m being honest. We’re holed up in the middle of the forest. They’ve got this weird, uh… I don’t know what it is. It’s kinda like a witch’s cauldron? But it’s huge, so I have no idea what they’re planning on throwing in there. At least it’s not near me.</p><p>Yeah, I’m kinda dangling on this giant spider web. It’s kinda impossible to break out of, what with my whole back being pressed into it and what not. Spider webs are sticky to flies, so I guess it makes sense that bigger ones would stick to humans.</p><p>That’s all well and good, but my face is getting itchy. It’d be nice to have one of my arms, at least. “Hey spider lady, can you come over here and scratch my forehead?”</p><p>“Quiet, vermin,” is the only response I get. Yeah, I prolly shoulda expected that. She starts crawling toward me on her giant spider legs and gets way too close for comfort. “Lest I scrape the skin from your muscles.”</p><p>Eh, I’ve heard worse. Working in the fast food industry long enough really desensitizes you to threats like that. All I do is nod and stare back off into space.</p><p>She all but yells in annoyance and shuffles away. My nonreaction is getting under her skin, apparently. “Commence the seance! He shall arrive at any moment.”</p><p>Oh, so this is a ritual. Good to know. </p><p>That still leaves one question, though. “Anyone wanna tell me what you need some random ‘ol human for, anyway?”</p><p>“Did I give you permission to speak, pest?” The spider lady crawls back up to me with this cheesy supervillain look on her face. She’s bordering on parody, at this point. “You’re merely a distraction.”</p><p>Oh, I’m being used as bait. Joy is me.</p><p>When she doesn’t continue her thought, I get irritated. “So are you gonna leave me in the dark here, or…?”</p><p>Her minions keep shuffling around and drawing lines in the dirt below us. “These imbeciles may live in ignorance, but I know of him,” she says, not at all less cryptic than before. “Son of the legendary Dark Knight Sparda, residing here in Red Grave…” Oh, so she’s either after Vergil or Dante. Makes se-</p><p>“Woah, woah, woah- back up.” That had to have been a slip of the tongue or something. “‘Son?’”</p><p>“Don’t be coy, human,” she says while looming in the center of her web. “Surely you’ve heard the legend of Sparda and his legacy.”</p><p>“Oh trust me, I know quite a bit about the Sparda family tree.” Probably too much, if we’re being honest. “What I’m wondering is if you do. You said ‘son’ as in singular, yeah?”</p><p>She growls at me. “What of it?! I am here for the descendant of the legendary Dark Knight, Dante!”</p><p>Oh. So that’s what’s going on.</p><p>I can’t stop myself from snorting. So none of them know about him, huh?</p><p>“And what is so humorous about your situation, filth?”</p><p>“Oh, nothing,” I say while shaking my head. They really don’t know. “Just thought you should know-”</p><p>I can’t finish my sentence before a demon starts shrieking in the distance. Judging by the blue light coming from the trees, I think I know who just showed up.</p><p>Took him long enough.</p><p>There’s a small explosion in the dirt and a cloud of dust fills the air. Eventually, Vergil steps out of it and shakes his head. “How do you keep ending up in these situations?”</p><p>“Bad luck?” I call back to him. “I’ll figure it out when I get outta here. Speaking of which, care to give me a hand?”</p><p>He whips out Yamato and looks back ahead of him. “And here I thought you weren’t a fan of hand puns.”</p><p>In the middle of my chuckling, the spider lady crawls off the web and up a nearby tree. “Seize him!” She spawns a weird looking staff as her lackeys march forward. “Rend his body limb from limb as he begs for mercy!”</p><p>And just like that, the fight starts up. None of her henchmen look very combat prepared. For some sorta demon war general, she’s doing a pretty bad job at leading her ‘army.’ Picking me was a horrible coincidence, on her part. Bet they didn’t expect me to befriend the not-so-legendary son of Sparda, eh?</p><p>In any case, I’m not too worried about this. Being stuck up here gives me a pretty good view of the whole fight, so I can see Vergil kick ass. If only they made popcorn. Oh well, at least we’ll be out of here soon enough.</p><p>There’s just one problem with that.</p><p>I, uh, think he’s losing.</p><p>Sure, a good portion of the demons look like they’ve never thrown a punch in their life, but there’s so many of them. Looks like this chick knows what she’s doing, after all- he’s out numbered by a long shot.</p><p>At some point, one of them lands a solid kick on him with its weird spider legs and he loses his footing. There’s a small cut on his forehead that’s bleeding slowly. In the years I’ve known him, he’s never bleed in front of me. Not once.</p><p>This ain’t good.</p><p>His movements become a little sloppier after a few minutes. There’s just so many of these things- he kills one and around twenty more try ganging up on him. Uh oh.</p><p>It’s when he gets knocked over that I finally get a little concerned. But there’s no way he’s gonna lose, yeah? He never loses.</p><p>Right?</p><p>As a group of demons start circling him, he stops and looks back over at me. There’s something about the look on his face that’s throwing me off- it changes from frustrated to surprised, then to something that looks like realization- and closes his eyes.</p><p>Then he pulls Yamato on himself.</p><p>Except instead of everything going blindingly bright like last time, the world goes pitch black. There’s a ton of demonic screeches for a few seconds, one of them being from the spider general, but I still can’t see anything. What the hell is going on?</p><p>Through the fog, I can see an abnormally large silhouette smack dab in the middle of it. That… certainly wasn’t there before. Um, should I be concerned?</p><p>When the fog eventually clears, there’s a few things of note going on. One thing is the amount of demon ashes on the ground. Yeesh, whatever he did didn’t just kill them- they got completely eviscerated.</p><p>Something else worth pointing out is that Vergil isn’t around anywhere. Hm, weird. Is there anything else important I should mention? </p><p>Oh yeah, there’s a twenty-something foot demon guy standing in front of me.</p><p>I’ve never seen someone with so many eyeballs. And they’re all in random places, too- wait, are those noses on his shoulders? This guy looks ridiculous.</p><p>And threatening.</p><p>…</p><p>This is Vergil’s demonic half, isn’t it?</p><p>Without saying anything, he walks up to me and detaches the webs. He’s so tall that he doesn’t even have to reach up or anything, yeesh.</p><p>Using his hand as a platform, I stand up and get a good look at the guy. “You’re a lot taller than I thought you’d be.”</p><p>He still doesn’t say anything. Guess that makes sense. I mean he is the demonic half, yeah? No wonder he’d be such a party pooper in this form.</p><p>Oh wait, I just thought of something. “You got a name?” If his human half had a different name, his demonic half should too. Hopefully it won’t be as ridiculous as ‘V.’</p><p>He doesn’t say anything for a good few seconds. All of his eyes are looking in different directions. That’s creepy as hell, jeez. “Urizen.”</p><p>‘Urizen?’ That’s not what I was expecting, but it sounds ominous enough to be his. Knowing Vergil, it’s probably a reference to some old poem or something.</p><p>I shouldn’t keep him hanging, in any case. “Well, Urizen,” I say while picking some smaller cobwebs off my jacket. “I appreciate the assist. But, uh, can ya put me down? I know V’s got a time limit too, and I’d rather not fall to my death when you disappear.”</p><p>Urizen considers me before saying anything. “He is merely limited by his lack of substantial power. I, on the other hand, am without limit.”</p><p>Huh. So by that logic, he can stay like this forever if he wants to. No wonder Vergil never lets this guy out.</p><p>Oh, well. I’ll try to make the most of this.</p><p>“Well, then,” I say while sitting down. His hands are big enough to lay on, so I might as well get comfortable. I let one of my legs dangle off the side and rest my head on the crook of his thumb. “Seeing as you’ve got so much free time, y’wanna go on a walk?”</p><p>He looks down at me with a mostly emotionless face, then nods. And then we’re off.</p><p>Judging by the looks of it, he’s walking further into the forest. That’s fair, all things considered- he’s taller than my house, for Pete’s sake. The whole city’d be in hysterics if this guy showed up.</p><p>Griffon (I think that’s what he called it) said something about Urizen turning the world to shit. I wonder if he’s gonna try something like that again. But hey, I’m not gonna try and stop him if he does. I’d prefer my head attached to the rest of my body, thank you very much. Still, though, I wonder if he’ll ever turn back into Vergil.</p><p>Eventually, we reach a clearing with a cliffside in it. It’s gotten pretty late since earlier, huh? It’s sunset now, so I guess I was there for a couple hours. At least I’m out now.</p><p>Urizen moves to sit down on the side of the cliff. He puts me down on his leg, so I guess I’ll just sit here for now. After that, we stare into nothing for a bit.</p><p>I gotta ask something after a few minutes. “I don’t mean to bug ya, dude, but why do you have so many eyes?” Asking him that might be stupid since he could pick me up and launch me if he wanted to, but the question’s been on my mind since I saw him.</p><p>Urizen doesn’t say anything at that. Tough egg to crack, eh? I look up to see the giant eye on his chest staring back at me. Spooky.</p><p>We keep staring into the distance for a while. Occasionally, I look up at him to see if anything’s changed. Even though he’s got a weird demon face, I can tell something’s on his mind. “You good, Urizen?”</p><p>That question finally gets him to look down at me properly. He sighs with his weirdly deep voice and finally speaks up. “You’re abnormally calm about this, human.”</p><p>“I could say the same to you.” Y’know, minus the human part. “Heard you haven’t been out in a while. I’m almost surprised you’re not leveling a city right now.”</p><p>“It would do me no good,” he says. His voice is kinda like Vergil’s, except way deeper and layered through something demonic. “And his interests have changed significantly over time. Unfortunately, mine have changed with them.”</p><p>So Urizen and Vergil have a common goal, then? Hm. The way Griffon described him, it sounded like they’d never be on the same page. Guess he’s mellowed out a lot since last time.</p><p>Regardless, that’s not up for me to judge. But now I’m curious. “How much Vergil y’got in there, anyway?”</p><p>He takes a second to think before responding. “Too much.”</p><p>“Wow, very descriptive,” I deadpan. He’s not giving me much to work with, eh? Definitely some Vergil in there. “Okay, let’s start with this- y’got an opinion on me?”</p><p>There’s a longer pause than I anticipated. Wow, he must really hate my guts or something. Harsh.</p><p>“As I said,” he finally speaks up. “Unfortunately, his interests and mine are one in the same.” He tsks. “He always was too sentimental.”</p><p>“‘Sentimental?’” That’s the last word I thought he’d say. “What are you getting at, Urizen?”</p><p>To my surprise, he lets out a nearly missable chuckle. Yet again, I feel like I’m missing something.</p><p>“Too sentimental, indeed.” Another sigh. “What was it that his book said?” He closes his eyes and leans back in thought. “‘If a thing loves, it is infinite.’”</p><p>‘If a thing loves.’</p><p>‘Love.’</p><p>…</p><p>Oh.</p><p>That… wasn’t what I was expecting. It takes a minute for my brain to catch up to me, but he said what he said, but now I know.</p><p>So what am I supposed to do about this?</p><p>Not once in a million years did I think Vergil would like me like that. He’s just a naturally awkward person, how was I supposed to know? Leave it to Vergil to throw me for a loop like this.</p><p>Y’know, I’ve never thought about, er, ‘loving’ Vergil like that. But the more I think about it, I really do care about the guy. Somedays, our little conversations are what keep me going. He’s become kinda ingrained into my life, I guess. It’s hard to imagine Red Grave without Vergil in it.</p><p>Well, this is quite the pickle. I have no idea what to make of this. Shit, I’m just as awkward as he is.</p><p>But I’ve gotta do something.</p><p>“Urizen,” I say after a while. With a little difficulty, I stand up and turn to face him. “C’mere.”</p><p>I motion for him to bring one of his hands over. He holds one out next to me, and I start patting his thumb reassuringly. “Urizen. I know you’ve been gone for a while, but I need to see Vergil. Y’think you can turn back for me?” It’s even creepier with all the eyes looking at me. “I’ll see you again.”</p><p>He exhales quietly as a mist fills the air. “Fool,” he says quietly. “I’m a part of him, am I not? I will always be with you.”</p><p>After that, he picks me up and puts me on the ground next to him. The mist gets a little more intense after that, but eventually it clears. Where Urizen once was, Vergil’s sitting on the edge of the cliff. He doesn’t turn around to greet me or anything.</p><p>I slowly walk up and sit next to him. We don’t look at each other- like I said, we’re both pretty awkward. Looks like neither of us know what to do.</p><p>“Hey,” I say after some time. “Is it okay if I…?” I reach over and softly put my hand on his own. He inhales sharply and looks down at it. Then he looks back at me.</p><p>“... yes,” he says quietly after a while, turning forward to look back at the sunset. “Yes. This is okay.”</p><p>“Cool,” is the best I can think to say. “... cool.”</p><p>Cool.</p><p>…</p><p>We spend the better part of the next hour looking over the cliff. We don’t really know what to say right now, but this is fine for now. We can figure it out later. The sun goes down at some point, but neither of us move to get up. Guess I’m gonna have to walk home in the dark.</p><p>That’s okay, though.</p><p>It’s cool.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. Unlike the other chapters, I've been thinking of this one for a while. I'm glad I finally wrote it down, haha. And I hope you all like it too! I hope the build up was worth it, hehe. Anyway, have a good rest of your day/night. &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0026"><h2>26. Local Demon Man Still Doesn't Know How Feelings Work</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's like talking to a brick wall. I'm starting to think even brick walls are more emotionally vulnerable than him, though.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. Sorry for the long wait, I had a lot of school stuff to do. I know I kinda left you with a bombshell for a bit, haha. Anyway here's a chapter or something.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I think Vergil’s avoiding me again.</p><p>He hasn’t shown up to get his groceries, recently, and I haven’t bumped into him in a while. Sure, it hasn’t been that long, but his absence is pretty noticeable… and annoying. Man, the last time he ignored me for this long was when that garbage can knocked my lights out. But that was different, and this is getting outright frustrating.</p><p>Last I saw him was with the whole Urizen situation. Granted, it was a little awkward, but he doesn’t have to go and avoid me for a week and a half. I mean seriously, how are we supposed to work this out if he doesn’t wanna talk about it?</p><p>But on the other hand, I know he needs time to think about it. And I do, too- don’t get me wrong, that was quite the confession he threw at me. But I’m not gonna get anywhere if we don’t sit down and talk this out.</p><p>Y’know what, screw it. I’m gonna go find him. </p><p>Sitting on the couch and brooding all day isn’t gonna get me anywhere. Guess I gotta take the bull by the horns, then. That’s right, as soon as I open this door I’m gonna be-</p><p>… huh. That’s convenient.</p><p>Opening the door immediately greets me with his ugly mug. Guess he must’ve gotten the same idea, eh? His arm immediately flinches away from the doorbell when I open the door. Then we’re staring each other down.</p><p>Well he saved me the trip, at least.</p><p>He hasn’t said anything yet. Is he just gonna stand there? Welp, someone’s gotta break the ice.</p><p>“I-</p><p>“How are-”</p><p>We both cut each other off and go quiet. Nope, I’m not gonna deal with another awkward silence. “You first.”</p><p>He clears his throat and looks to the side. “I was going to ask if you’re doing well.”</p><p>“Really?” It’s so easy to tell he’s lying. He’s clearly got something else on his mind. He moves to say something else, but I cut him off. “Y’know what? Come inside, man. We need to talk.”</p><p>And then we’re both sitting on my couch. His eyes are drifting every which way, occasionally glancing at me only to look anywhere else. Oh, boy.</p><p>“Okay,” I say in an attempt to lighten the mood. “Let’s cut to the chase- why are you here?”</p><p>Vergil opens his mouth to say something, then hesitates. Whatever he’s about to say, he’s thinking about it way too hard.</p><p>After about half a minute passes, I groan to myself. “Vergil. Buddy. You’ve gotta work with me.”</p><p>“I…” Thank the heavens above, he actually got a noise out. What a miracle.</p><p>And then there’s more silence.</p><p>“Duuuuuuuuuude,” I say while slumping into the couch. Uhg, he’s hopeless. Now is not the time to be emotionally obtuse. “C’mon, gimme something to work with. Please?”</p><p>He scratches the back of his head in embarrassment. “Sorry.” He sighs. “I’m not sure what to say.”</p><p>Okay, that’s something. “Just say what’s on your mind, man.”</p><p>It takes him a second to figure out what to say next, but he doesn’t leave me in suspense again. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”</p><p>“Hm.” Alright, focus. If this was anyone else, this’d be a lot easier. But this is Vergil we’re talking about- I’ve gotta tread lightly. “Well let’s start here- what Urizen said was true, yeah?”</p><p>He deafly nods without looking at me.</p><p>“Okay. Do you want anything to change?”</p><p>“I…” Oh shoot, that might’ve been a loaded question. Shit, I’m no better than he is at this. “I don’t know. This is new to me.”</p><p>New to him? “Didn’t you have a kid, though? Did you not, like, care about her or something?”</p><p>“Not exactly.” He starts motioning to the air while trying to explain what he means. “I was young and foolish. This is… different.”</p><p>Huh. Guess he’s gotten a little emotionally mature since then, if nothing else. Can’t really argue with that.</p><p>“... well?”</p><p>Oh, was he expecting something? “Well what?”</p><p>There’s another pause before he responds. “What now?”</p><p>“Oh. Yeah, I have no idea.”</p><p>“You- what?” He looks at me like I’ve got three heads. “I thought you knew what you were talking about.”</p><p>“I dunno, man,” I say while throwing my hands up. “I thought you’d know what to say if I got you talking.”</p><p>“I don’t know what to say-”</p><p>“Yeah, no kidding-”</p><p>“Well perhaps if you wouldn’t make assumptions-”</p><p>“Oh, you’re one to talk-”</p><p>And thus begins a very petty and drawn out argument. Neither of us say anything to actually hurt the other’s feelings- I don’t think either of us are actually mad, per se- but that doesn’t stop us. Butting heads with him is easier than talking about our feelings, that’s for sure.</p><p>At least we’re talking again.</p><p>“Honestly, I don’t know why I ever expect anything outta you, Mr. ‘Ignores-Someone-for-a-Week-to-Avoid-Talking-About-Feelings.’”</p><p>“You could have thought out that insult more thoroughly-”</p><p>“Yeah, whatever, I’m making pasta.”</p><p>“You- huh?”</p><p>“What? Cut me some slack, I haven’t eaten all day. I can’t keep insulting you on an empty stomach.” And also I just wanted to throw him off guard, but he doesn’t need to know that. “You like fettuccine?”</p><p>He continues to look at me incredulously. A tiny grumbled ‘fine’ is all I get in return.</p><p>“Fettuccine it is.” Great, cause I don’t have a lot of food in my cabinets, and I really don’t feel like going out right now. Uhg, I hate cooking. “We’ll talk about it some other time. In the meantime, let’s just like- I dunno- take baby steps or some shit.”</p><p>“‘Baby steps?’”</p><p>“Yeah, baby steps,” I say while grabbing one of those pre bought pasta bags outta the cabinet. No way am I making this from scratch. “It’s like- we can move slowly, y’know?”</p><p>He mumbles something under his breath and considers something. After what feels like too long, he seems to agree.</p><p>Good. We’re on the same page again.</p><p>I’d never say it out loud, but I’m glad to have him back.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there it is. I'm glad you've all stuck around this long. I'm planning on going for at least a few more chapters, but we'll see how it goes. Anyhow I've got work in a few minutes so I've gotta go. See ya later, gamers.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0027"><h2>27. Nothing a Little Salt Can't Fix</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Remember to use oven mitts if you're planning on touching a pot.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Howdy, everyone. I'm trying to write chapters as frequently as I can. School and family drama just gets in the way a lot, y'know? Well in any case, here's another one.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>How do you make fettuccine, exactly?</p><p>Why did my mind have to jump to pasta? Maybe I shoulda suggested something I actually know how to make. I can’t do that now, though. I already promised Vergil I’d make this. And no way in Hell am I gonna admit that I don’t know how.</p><p>Guess I’ll just have to figure it out, then.</p><p>In the middle of squinting at the back of the box, Vergil makes a confused noise somewhere behind me. Oh great, what now? I don’t wanna go back to the awkward-ass conversation from before. “You need something back there?”</p><p>I glance behind me to see him leaning on my table. “I would have figured you’d start it by now, is all.”</p><p>“Hold your horses, man.” How impatient, jeez. “I’ve just never made this, ‘s all.”</p><p>He makes another weird noise and walks up next to me. Alright, if I can just-</p><p>“Hey!” He grabs the box right outta my hands and looks at it himself. That bastard, using his height against me.</p><p>After peering at it for a few seconds, he looks over at the stove. “This looks simple enough.”</p><p>“I mean, yeah,” I say while scratching my head. It's not rocket science or anything. “The box says it’ll only take forty minutes, give or take.”</p><p>“Then we have our work cut out for us.” Before I can ask what he means, he grabs a pot from one of my cabinets and throws it on the stove.</p><p>“Go sit down, man.” I’d feel bad if he had to help me out with this. People are supposed to cook for their guests, right? “I got this.”</p><p>He rolls up his sleeves without saying anything. He’s been wearing more casual clothes more often the past few months, I’ve noticed. “I’d prefer my pasta unburnt, if that’s okay.”</p><p>What an asshole. Here I am trying to be nice to him, and he goes and insults my (lack of) cooking skills. Who does he think he is?</p><p>All I do is elbow him and go to grab some ingredients. Alright what did the box say? Uh usually you’re supposed to have butter in it, I think. And cheese? Cheese. Parmesan’ll have to do.</p><p>I dump it all on the counter next to us. “Alright, that should be it. Are we missing anything?”</p><p>Vergil looks up and down on the back of the box to double check. “Garlic powder.”</p><p>Garlic powder? “That’s unfortunate, seeing as I don’t have any here.” Why don’t the manufacturers just include it in the box or something?</p><p>I almost miss the box when he tosses it to me. “One moment, please.”</p><p>Next thing I know, he pulls out Yamato and opens a portal right in my kitchen. I’d be annoyed, but he did kinda open a portal in my house that one time. Wouldn’t be the first time this happened. Then he steps through it.</p><p>The portal doesn’t disappear, weirdly enough. Usually the thing zips itself shut right as he enters. It sucks that I can’t go through these, honestly. It only takes around twenty seconds for him to pop back through the portal, garlic powder in hand.</p><p>“... y’know what? I’m not gonna ask.” I don’t need to know what dark alley he disappeared into to get this. “Let’s get to work, shall we?”</p><p>He opens the jar with a satisfying ‘pop.’ Now it’s time for the hard part.</p><p>“Alright, first thing’s first: gotta get some water boiling.” Sounds easy enough. We fill the pot with water and sit it on the stove. Now we just gotta wait for it to boil.</p><p>…</p><p>Or maybe, we don’t have to.</p><p>“Say, Vergil.” This is such a stupid idea, but it’ll be stupidly funny if it works. “Y’think you could speed up the whole boiling process a little?”</p><p>He looks at me completely cluelessly. Rolling my eyes, I point to the top of my head. Then it’s time for him to eyeroll.</p><p>He doesn’t disagree, though.</p><p>He lifts the pot above his head and, with what I can only describe as the most exasperated sigh I’ve ever heard, turns into his devil form. They say blue flames are hotter than yellow ones, right? Well by that logic, the fire spewing out of his horns should boil the water in a few seconds.</p><p>And the best part is that it works.</p><p>After half a minute, he sits the now boiling water back on the burner and turns back into a human. “Your ideas never cease to impress,” he says, completely dripping with sarcasm.</p><p>Hey, a sarcastic compliment is a compliment nonetheless. I lean on the counter and shoot him a smirk. “Where would you be without me?”</p><p>“On a lovely vacation, I'm sure.”</p><p>“Oh shut up, just add the noodles already.”</p><p>Alrighty. Now that the noodles are in the pot, we can get to the sauce. He grabs a saucepan and puts it on the burner next to the noodles.</p><p>I start squinting at the box again. “Says here we need a cup of butter, some salt and a little garlic.” It doesn’t really specify how much we need of the last two, though, so I guess we’ll just have to wing it.</p><p>He grabs the cup of butter while I try to decide how much we need. Alright, so the garlic is what gives it its flavor, but salt can make anything taste better. If I add too much garlic, there’ll be no way of saving the sauce. Salt, though, I can probably just lather on and it’ll be fine.</p><p>I’ll just add a little bit of both, just to be safe.</p><p>With all that outta the way, it’s time to add the cheese to the sauce. Apparently you’re supposed to use different types of cheeses in it? All I’ve got is parmesan, though, so Vergil better not throw a hissy fit over it. He prolly won't mind.</p><p>And finally, everything’s on its way to being done. Now all we’ve gotta do is wait.</p><p>And stir, of course.</p><p>…</p><p>Everything looks good after around half an hour.</p><p>We both turn off our respective burners- I took the noodles, he has the sauce- and give it a second to simmer. Perfect. Now all we’ve gotta do is drain the noodles, and everything’ll be-</p><p>Why is Vergil grabbing the sauce? “What are you doing?”</p><p>He looks at me like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Pouring the sauce in the noodles.”</p><p>“We haven’t drained them yet, dude.” There’s practically an entire quarter pot’s worth of water in there.</p><p>“We don’t need to.”</p><p>“What kinda pasta have you been eating?” He can’t be for real. “Put down the sauce, man.”</p><p>When he doesn’t put the pan back down on the stove, I try shoving his face away in an attempt to stall him. “Just let me drain it!”</p><p>“I’m telling you, we don’t need to drain it.” He keeps trying to pour the sauce in the pot, much to my annoyance. Why’s he gotta be so stubborn?</p><p>Without thinking about it, I try to grab the pot. It’s only then that I remember oh yeah, Vergil’s got his heat resistant demon hands. I do not.</p><p>It burns.</p><p>“Oh shit-” I panic while jerking my hand away from it. My panicking causes him to put the pan down out of instinct. “I hate these things.”</p><p>“Are you alright?” Yeesh, he sounds way too concerned for a pot, of all things. If only Vergil cared about the quality of his pasta as much as he does about me.</p><p>“Let’s just drain the noodles, alright?”</p><p>…</p><p>These noodles aren’t half bad.</p><p>I won’t lie, it tasted a little funky at first. When you add a little more salt, though, it’s actually pretty good. That was a good call, on my part.</p><p>I can’t help but smirk at the content look Vergil’s got on his face. “Well?”</p><p>He finishes chewing his food before answering. “Draining the noodles before the salt wasn’t a horrible idea.” I sigh at that. Once again, he won’t admit when he’s wrong.</p><p>“Yeah, man. The water’ll dilute the sauce or something,” I say while waving my hand around. I don’t completely know what I’m talking about. But hey, I don’t gotta be a chief to know how sauce works.</p><p>He lets out a quiet ‘hm,’ then we go back to eating. We spend the rest of the evening eating and cracking jokes, honestly. These chill conversations with Vergil are always pleasant. Talking about stupid shit just comes so easily with him.</p><p>Let’s just hope he gets better cooking methods next time, for both of our sakes.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the chapter. I'm glad that so many of you like how awkwardly I write Vergil. I'd imagine he's kinda bad at sustaining relationships- let alone having a partner- given how, well, Vergil-y he is. In any case, I hope you liked this one. Until next time, everyone.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0028"><h2>28. Puzzling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Five-thousand pieces? No problem.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, guys. I've thought of a few more chapter ideas in the past couple days, so I'm prolly gonna be posting a little more frequently for a while. Here's a chapter for the time being. :]</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Dodo, dododo…”</p><p>Finally, a day to myself. I’ve had work the past few weeks, y’know, and the only other day I had off was spent cleaning up my kitchen after the whole fettuccine fiasco. Who knew that cooking with Vergil would get so messy?</p><p>In any case, I decided to do something relaxing today. I’ve had this five-thousand piece puzzle sitting in my closet for who knows how long, and y’know what? I’ve got nothing better to do. I figured I’d give it a shot.</p><p>And I’m not regretting that decision.</p><p>“Badababa, chch bodo…” Quietly humming to myself while organizing the pieces is really relaxing. All the side pieces go to the left, middle pieces go to the right, corners in the middle…</p><p>Right when I’m in the zone, my phone starts ringing. Someone’s trying to bother me on my off day, huh? Eh, whatever. It’s not like I’m doing anything important. I press the answer button without thinking about it and put it on speaker. “Hello?”</p><p>“Hello.”</p><p>“Oh, hey Vergil.” That’s a pleasant surprise. This is the first time he’s ever called me, I think- the shoe’s on the other foot, most of the time. “What’s up?”</p><p>“Nothing interesting.” Alright, so it’s not an emergency. That’s a relief. “I wanted to ask how you’re doing.”</p><p>Aw, that’s nice of him. “Decent enough,” I say while moving more pieces in their places. “I’m making a puzzle right now. It’s pretty relaxing, actually.”</p><p>“Really?” He sounds like he’s holding back a chuckle. “Puzzles are typically made with children in mind, are they not?”</p><p>“For your information,” I say with fake offense, “there’s nothing childish about it. It’s enhancing my problem solving skills.”</p><p>He lets out a little half sigh, half chuckle. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”</p><p>“Try it yourself, if you don’t believe me.” I smack my elbow on the table and lean my face on my hand. “Unless you’re not smart enough for it. I get it.”</p><p>“As if.” Yup, that got his panties in a bunch.</p><p>“Prove it.” He’s practically begging me to challenge him, at this point. “Getchur ass over here and gimme a hand. And bring food, while you’re at it.”</p><p>I can practically hear his eyes roll through the phone. “Is takeout fine?”</p><p>“Just peachy.”</p><p>He hangs up the phone without saying anything else. It’s a good thing he’s buying- I don’t have the energy to clean up the kitchen again. Who knew that cooking in a kitchen would be such a bad idea?</p><p>Eh, whatever. Now where was I? Right- side pieces to the left, middle pieces to the right, corner pieces in the middle…</p><p>…</p><p>After around twenty minutes, a portal opens in the front room. I don’t bother looking up when someone steps through it. “Took ya long enough.”</p><p>He starts grumbling something to himself. “I go out of my way to buy food, and this is the thanks I get in return…”</p><p>He sits down to me and lays the food further away on the table so that it isn’t touching the puzzle. Oh sweet, he got Chinese food.</p><p>“Appreciate the food, man.” I sit up slightly more and grab one of the boxes of noodles. He got a side of dumplings with it, too? Impeccable taste.</p><p>He makes a small ‘hm’ noise and starts eating his noodles. He sits there and neatly eats while I try to move the puzzle pieces around while shoving food into my mouth. A little help would be nice, but I’ll manage.</p><p>And then two spectral arms start moving the pieces.</p><p>Looking to Vergil’s left greets me with a determined looking Doppelänger focused in on the puzzle. It briefly stops so that it can look up and wave at me. “Hello to you too, Doppel,” I say while waving back. D’aw, its enthusiasm is always so infectious.</p><p>The next few minutes are spent with me and Doppel getting the pieces set up. At some point, I decide to put on some background music. It’s pretty hard to hold a conversation when you’re shoveling noodles in your mouth, believe it or not.</p><p>With the help of Doppel, I manage to move everything into neatly organized piles. Now the real challenge can begin. We’re just about out of noodles, too, so we can finally work together.</p><p>“Alright, Vergil. Time to put your puzzle solving skills to the test.” I motion to the table and lean back in my chair. “Let’s get this started.”</p><p>He nods deafly and looks down at the pieces. For some reason, he starts rifling through the middle pieces. Weird. Usually people are supposed to start at the corners and work their way around the corner. To each their own, I guess.</p><p>While he works on the middle, Doppel and I get started on the border. It’s kinda impressive how Vergil is able to do two different things at the same time. Doppel is an extension of his being, y’know? So the fact that he’s able to focus on two different pieces of a puzzle is interesting. I wonder if Doppel just straight up has its own thought process or something.</p><p>Eh, I’ll ask later. I’ve got some different questions on my mind. “Ey, Vergil.”</p><p>He doesn’t look up from what he’s doing. “Hm?”</p><p>“So I’ve been wondering,” I say while connecting the border. “Do demons have any weaknesses or something?”</p><p>“You’re not getting any ideas, are you?”</p><p>“Ah yes, because I’d totally be able to take you on in a fight.”</p><p>“You can certainly try.”</p><p>“Just answer the question.”</p><p>He cackles under his breath before continuing. “Much like humans, we demons have our weaknesses.” He tries to connect two mismatching pieces during his explanation, then gives up and tries another pair. “It all depends on who you’re fighting.”</p><p>Alright, that makes sense. “So if I was fighting like- like a fiery guy, you could beat it with water.”</p><p>“In theory, yes.”</p><p>“And if there was an ice guy, I could beat it with like fire- no wait, lava.” Yeah, that sounds about right. “I could totally beat it with lava.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes again. “Of course. Just go buy some lava from your local convenience store, as all humans do-”</p><p>I jokingly elbow him. “It’s a hypothetical, man. Lay off.”</p><p>I ask him a few more questions while we work on the puzzle. So here’s a few things I learn from it: that fancy little sword trick he does every now and then where he cuts things in a little bubble? Yeah, apparently that’s called a ‘Judgement Cut.’ Apparently only he can do it- well as far as he knows, at least. When I ask him where the name came from, he just shrugs his shoulders and moves on. He totally named it himself.</p><p>Then I ask him what Urizen did last time he came out. I didn’t live here at the time, so the most I saw of it were these short news segments about the aftermath. Apparently there was this huge demon tree that fed on human blood, and a ton of roots sprung from the ground and caused a ton of property damage and casualties. Yeesh, Urizen used to be a lot more ruthless apparently.</p><p>Now according to Vergil, V went on this whole journey to try and stop Urizen. From the sounds and looks of it, Urizen’s had some time to mellow out in Vergil since then. Now this is just a hunch, but I’m gonna assume Vergil was a lot more demonic before the whole ‘rectifying the sins of the past’ thing V had going on.</p><p>Thank goodness for V, then.</p><p>In the middle of me asking whether or not he’s stronger than Dante (he swears that he is, by the way), I notice a problem. “Uh, Vergil…”</p><p>He stops mid-rant to look down at the puzzle. Yup, this is a bit of a problem.</p><p>So Vergil and I managed to get most of the puzzle done. It’s only been what, two hours-ish? Pretty good, right?</p><p>Well here’s the problem: we’re missing a piece.</p><p>Just our luck. We managed to get the whole thing done- a whole five-thousand pieces- only to lose the last one. Great.</p><p>Both of us look around us both on and around the table. Doppel starts walking around and looking for it on the floor. Nope, there’s no sign of it.</p><p>Eventually, Vergil stands up and does another onceover of the floor. He leans his hands on the table and sighs. “How disappointing.” How disappointing, indeed.</p><p>But y’know what? I can make the best of this. “At least we had fun while doing it,” I say while standing up next to him. “The journey matters more than the destination, as they say.”</p><p>He glances over at my chair and points to the seat. “I think you were sitting on it, actually.”</p><p>“Oh.” I look over at my chair and yep, I was totally sitting on it this whole time.</p><p>“Y’know what? Forget what I said.” I pick up the piece and put it in the middle of the puzzle. Then we’ve got the whole thing done. “Screw the journey.”</p><p>With the puzzle done, Vergil despawns Doppel and looks at the puzzle fondly. I don’t know why I feel so accomplished right now. It’s just a puzzle, for Pete’s sake- I shouldn’t feel this satisfied.</p><p>But I do. I pull out my phone and open the camera app. “Get in here, Vergil.”</p><p>He shakes his head and crouches by the puzzle next to me. Then there’s a pause.</p><p>“... what?”</p><p>“And Doppel.”</p><p>For the third time today, he rolls his eyes while summoning Doppel behind the table. Once I’ve got the shot lined up, I take a picture of us. I’m holding up a little peace sign on the left, Vergil’s got his arms crossed on the right, and Doppel’s pointing to the puzzle in the middle.</p><p>I lean on the table while taking it in. “It’s a better pic than last time, I’ll give you that.”</p><p>Doppel takes a look at the picture and gives an enthusiastic thumbs up. Vergil’s just got this small smile on his face. I’m glad we’re all on the same page.</p><p>With everything said and done, Vergil decides to take his leave. He slices a portal in my front room again and signals goodbye. Then he steps on through. Before Doppel leaves, it practically lifts my feet off the ground in a bone crushing hug. “See ya later, Doppel,” I manage to squeak out. Then it strolls on through the portal, and that’s that.</p><p>I’m glad that the day still turned out to be so chill despite the company. I was just expecting to spend the day alone, spending hours working on a puzzle by myself. And that still woulda been cool, don’t get me wrong, but I certainly don’t mind the company.</p><p>There’s only one problem now: I’ve gotta clean up the whole thing and put it back in the box. Eh, I’ll do it some other day.</p><p>It’s my day off, after all.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. I actually thought of this one cause I bought a ton of LEGOs recently. Thought it'd be fun to build something with Vergil, y'know? But that's unimportant- you guys have a good day.</p><p>Also I just wanted to add a little addendum here: you can follow me on Twitter if you feel like it. @personthatdmcs</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0029"><h2>29. Brace Yourself</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Seeing a 40-something year old demon with dental issues is not what I intended to deal with this week.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. So I decided to split this chapter in half because it turned out so long, and I think it'll actually be better that way. Hope you like it. :]</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Alright, you’ve gotta be pulling this outta your ass.”</p><p>When I invited Vergil over to watch some movies and relax for the day, I wasn’t expecting to hear a story about a giant demon tower rising in the middle of the street. What did he call it, the ‘Temen Ni Gru’ or something? Now I know Vergil’s pulled a lot of crazy (and stupid) stunts in his life, but this one takes the cake. You’d think this woulda gotten more news coverage at the time or something.</p><p>“It’s true,” he keeps insisting. “It was meant to be a gateway to the underworld-”</p><p>“Dude,” I cut him off. “Just… okay, so you rose a tower from the ground because some creepy old dude told you it’d give you power. Is that right?”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“And you believed him?”</p><p>“Okay.” I start laughing before he can continue. Holy shit, he used to be so gullible. “It sounds worse than it actually was.” At least he sees how ridiculous this is, too- he laughs a bit to himself and flashes a toothy grin.</p><p>Hm. Speaking of teeth…</p><p>My laughing dies down a bit when I look back up at him. Huh, I never noticed that ‘till now.</p><p>His smile fades into a look of confusion at that. “What’s wrong?”</p><p>“Hang on, do- do that again.” I’ve gotta make sure I just saw that right.</p><p>Judging by the look on his face, he doesn’t know what I’m talking about. Maybe he’s never noticed, either.</p><p>“Hang on, just,” I start while pulling the side of his lip down. He cringes at it- I don’t blame him, honestly- but doesn’t say anything.</p><p>Okay, so I did see that right.</p><p>I remove my hand from his face and sit back where I was on the couch. “Your teeth are crooked, man.”</p><p>Vergil quirks an eyebrow. He doesn’t look too bothered, though, so I’m guessing he’s more confused if anything.</p><p>How’d his teeth get this screwed up, anyway? I mean, he’s a half demon. I woulda figured he could just shift his teeth around willy nilly if he wanted to. If he can change his entire body from a normal looking human to a sleep paralysis demon, I’d think he could just fix his teeth.</p><p>On the other hand, though, there’s a pretty good chance that he can’t. That’s not really a problem, per se. It’d probably just mean he’d have to use conventional human things, like toothpaste and…</p><p>“When’s the last time you saw a dentist?”</p><p>I don’t get a response. We just stare at each other blankly and wait for the other to say something.</p><p>You’ve gotta be kidding me. “Don’t tell me…”</p><p>He breaks eye contact and looks at the floor next to him. I pinch the bridge of my nose in frustration. “Vergil…”</p><p>“In my defense,” he starts while making vague hand gestures in the air, “I was preoccupied for a few years, as you know.” He scratches the back of his head. “And I was on the streets as a kid- it was out of my hands.”</p><p>“And you haven’t visited one since?” This man’s gonna be the death of me, I swear. “Vergil. Buddy. My baby, my honey, my ragtime gal- you’re going to the dentist. Hell, I’ll take you to an orthodontist at this rate.”</p><p>He scoffs and crosses his arms. “That’s unnecessary. A son of Sparda shouldn’t need to-”</p><p>“Blah, blah, blah. Sparda ain’t fixing your teeth, buddy.” I pull out my phone to find the closest orthodontist in the area. “I’m booking you an appointment for April 2nd. I’ll pick you up at nine- don’t think you can weasel your way out of this.”</p><p>With no further arguments, he leans backwards into the couch and lets me schedule a check-up for him. What he doesn’t know, though, is what’s gonna come next.</p><p>Now I’m assuming he’s not gonna have many cavities- what with the whole demon thing, and all that- but his teeth are crazy bent. He’s probably gonna need a retainer which, unfortunately, is coming outta my wallet. The things I do for this guy, I swear…</p><p>…</p><p>After around a week and a half, it’s finally time for him to get his teeth checked. The drive there is kinda awkward. He seems like he doesn’t wanna be here, go figure. But he can’t just not get his teeth fixed up. He’s prolly got a nasty case of gingivitis or something, jeez.</p><p>I walk him up to the front desk and fill out a few files. I’d assume he needs the help with them, given that he’s never been to one of these. Or maybe he was just here a really long time ago as a kid. He never really gave me a straight answer on that, did he?</p><p>Regardless, we sit down and wait in the lobby for his turn in. There aren’t many people in here right now- there’s some kid and her mom near the play section, some old guy looking at the model dentures they’ve got set up, some guy who I think is asleep?- so really, it’s uneventful. Vergil keeps bouncing his leg in his seat, though. Is he nervous or something?</p><p>Eventually, a doc comes out and calls his name. He doesn’t stand up immediately, so I have to elbow him and snap him outta the weird stupor he’s in. And just like that, he disappears into the back rooms. Now I’ve gotta wait.</p><p>I decided to stick around since I have no idea when he’s gonna come out. The whole demon healing stuff’ll probably freak out the dentists a little, and there’s no telling what they’re gonna decide to do with him. Good grief.</p><p>So I’ve gotta wonder- considering his whole demonic healing thing, would that make the process longer or shorter? Or maybe it doesn’t work on his teeth. I can’t imagine there’s much of a reason for him to have healing abilities in his mouth, after all. Once again, this is making my head hurt. He better get out of there soon.</p><p>That’s it, I’m taking a nap. He’ll show up eventually.</p><p>…</p><p>Woah, what the- oh yeah, I’m at the orthodontist. What time is it?</p><p>Looking over at the digital clock on the wall greets me with a bright red ‘10:42 P.M.’ He’s been in there for like an hour and a half and still hasn’t come out… Yeesh, what’s taking him so long?</p><p>Whatever they’re doing in there, they’d better hurry it up. Smelling freshly cleaned teeth gets pretty stale after a while, believe me-</p><p>A worker there walks up to me midthought. “You’re with Mr. Sparda, correct?”</p><p>“That, I am,” I say while sitting up a little further. “Why? What’s wrong?”</p><p>The worker takes a few seconds before answering. “Nothing’s… wrong.” Uh oh, something’s totally wrong. “I’d just like to let you know that we gave him a few, er, unorthodox treatments.” The doc puts her hand on her forehead and mumbles something under her breath. “I still don’t understand how he healed so fast…”</p><p>Well, that’s awfully cryptic. Vergil’s whole demon thing must’ve thrown them for a loop. Whatever they did to him, I just hope he’s not too-</p><p>Oh… oh boy.</p><p>Just as the worker hands me more paperwork to fill out, Vergil walks right out the door back into the lobby. Well I say walk, but it’s more like a droopy, vaguely depressed looking shuffle. This must’ve done a number on his ego.</p><p>That’s not the part I’m focused on, though. What I’m really looking at are the dark blue wires he’s got sticking under his lip. This is damn near unbelievable; Vergil- son of the Legendary Dark Knight, the ‘Black Angel’ or whatever he called himself that one time- is currently wearing braces.</p><p>And he doesn’t look too happy about it, either.</p><p>He sits down next to me while I fill out the paperwork. I can’t even think of anything snarky to say, especially now that he looks this miserable. This is just plain awkward.</p><p>As I go to hand the paperwork to the lady at the front desk, she says something. “We’ve scheduled him to come in and have them removed in a month’s time.” Just a month? Jeez… She doesn’t say anything after that. All she does is sit there and glance at Vergil every now and then with a stressed out look in her eyes.</p><p>Huh. Vergil’s demon powers really did a number on these poor guys. I deafly nod my head at her while walking back over to Vergil. He doesn’t look any less miserable than before.</p><p>Oh, boy.</p><p>I motion for him to get up so we can leave. We don’t say anything on our way out, nor on our way to the car, nor when I start the engine. It’s pretty silent for the better half of the ride to my place before he says anything.</p><p>“I blame you for this-sh.”</p><p>“Here we go.” I knew that was coming. “Maybe this wouldn’t be so much of an issue if you actually took care of your teeth.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes and groans a little. I’m right and he knows it.</p><p>I’d snap back at him with something, but he just looks so upset. I won’t admit it out loud, but I hate seeing him like this. It’s not too often that he looks this, well, unVergil-y. Shit, I feel kinda bad for him.</p><p>“I’m sorry, dude,” I say a little dejectedly. “I can just take you back to your place, if you want.”</p><p>He jerks up a little at the suggestion. “I don’t want Dante to s-sh-ee me like this-sh.” He runs a hand through his hair, clearly stressed out.</p><p>So he doesn’t want his little bro to think any less of him, huh? Honestly, I don’t think Dante would care one way or the other. Sure, he might tease him every now and then, but that’d be the extent of it.</p><p>Something I’ve come to learn about Vergil, though, is that he really cares about his reputation around certain people. In his mind, he’d never be able to live something like this down. I’m one of the only people he fully lets his guard down around, as far as I know.</p><p>Well, shit. Y’know what? I got him into this situation- the least I can do is give him a way out. “You can spend the month at my place, if you want.”</p><p>In my periphery, I can see him look at me with something like surprise. Instead of arguing like he usually does, though, he asks something a bit more softly than he usually does. “You’d really let me do that?”</p><p>“Nooooo,” I drone on sarcastically. “I offered you to stay at my place as a joke- of course you can, dude. It’s the least I can do.” </p><p>While pulling into my driveway, his look turns into something less like surprise and more like… fondness? Huh, that’s a look he usually doesn’t wear. It fits him, though. “I appreciate that.”</p><p>“No prob, man.”</p><p>Even with the car parked, we both take a few seconds to smile at each other before leaving. Man, I really do love this asshole.</p><p>In any case, we’re finally walking back to my front door. Hopefully he won’t be too moody about the braces thing. And he’s gonna have to call Dante at some point to let him know what’s going on. I swear, if I wake up one day to the sound of a half demon kicking down my door to find his brother, I’m not gonna be too thrilled about it…</p><p>In any case, this is bound to be an interesting month.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the chapter. I honestly meant to write this a lot sooner, but I had to get some school stuff done. I'm planning on posting a few more chapters next week, which I'm looking forward to. Anyway that's about it for now, see ya next chapter!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0030"><h2>30. Movies, Board Games, and a Month of General Boredom</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>I know Vergil likes chocolate, but this is getting outta hand.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hi, everyone. I decided to write a bit of a longer chapter this time around because, y'know, why the hell not? So uh, yeah. Have fun with this.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You can’t keep putting it off, dude.”</p><p>It’s only been around thirty minutes into Vergil’s stay here and he’s already giving me problems. Why does he have to be so stubborn about calling Dante, of all things? I don’t think it’s that much to ask for. Leave it to Vergil to argue about it.</p><p>And he’s still going, too. “And how do you s-sh-uggest getting pas-sh-t the lis-sh-p?”</p><p>Okay, he’s got a point there. But he can’t just not let him know, though. “I don’t want Dante kicking down my door at the ass-crack of dawn looking for his older brother.” I hand him my phone, caller ID just waiting to be pressed. “Just make something up, man- I don’t care.”</p><p>After some unneeded hesitation, he finally caves and grabs my phone. Before calling, though, he rolls his eyes and points the screen back at me. “‘Stinky Devil Man.’ Really?”</p><p>Oh yeah, I forgot I named it that. “I couldn’t think of anything funnier, shut up.” I hop over the back of the couch and sit next to him. “Just call your brother already.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes again before finally calling. With the phone up to his ear, I can’t make out what Dante will say, but that’s alright. It’s none of my business, really.</p><p>Vergil speaks after a few seconds. “Hello, brother.” He leans forward in his seat. “I’m calling from a s-sh-ecluded part of Red Grave.”</p><p>Then he frowns and scratches the back of his head. “My voic-sh-e is no different, Dante. That is-sh merely poor rec-sh-eption.” Okay, that’s a decent excuse for something he came up with on the fly. “I thought I should let you know,” he continues, “that I won’t be back for some time.”</p><p>Then his frown turns into an all out scowl and he white knuckles the phone. “For your informat-sh-ion, Dante, I am on a very important miss-sh-ion, and I don’t need you ruining it for me.” Uh oh. Whatever Dante said must’ve gotten under his skin. “I will be home in a month’s-sh time. Good day.”</p><p>Without saying anything else, he hangs up and puts the phone next to me. Then he all but slides down the couch and groans. “Curs-sh-ed human teeth,” is all I can hear as he smacks a throw pillow in his face. He’s a wreck.</p><p>I’m guessing his teeth shifting around so fast must be a little painful, then.</p><p>I stand up and pat him on the back before walking to the kitchen. “I’ll get you some ice cream, buddy.”</p><p>…</p><p>A few hours into his stay, we manage to scrub through a couple movies together. I let him pick both of them cause, y’know, he’s a little bit grumpy at the moment. And surprise surprise, he put on some old black and white mystery movie. I shoulda known he was gonna pick something boring.</p><p>We get around halfway through the movie before I finally cave. “This is so lame.”</p><p>He keeps picking his spoon at his mostly empty carton of ice cream. “Maybe don’t let me pick the movie next time.”</p><p>“It was a pity pick.” Uhg, I can’t stand this anymore. Watching paint dry would be more interesting.</p><p>Right when I’m about to get up, Vergil rubs the side of his jaw. Huh. He’s kinda been sitting in his own misery for a few hours, hasn’t he? “You feeling alright, dude?”</p><p>He scoffs unconvincingly. “I can deal with a s-sh-mall toothache.”</p><p>“I know, man. But would it kill ya to take some ibuprofen?” Has he seriously never considered taking a few meds?</p><p>“You’re running under the ass-sh-umption that human medic-sh-ation would affect a half demon,” he says while rolling his eyes. “Which it won’t. Not in any s-sh-ignificant way, at least.”</p><p>Wait a minute, that doesn’t really make much sense. “What about the numbing shot the orthodontists gave you? If that worked, I don’t see why other medicine can’t.”</p><p>… unless…</p><p>“It… it did numb you, right?”</p><p>There’s a long stretch of silence where we both stare each other down. There’s… there’s no way.</p><p>After a deafening pause, he mumbles something quietly to himself. “It was s-sh-upposed to numb me?”</p><p>Are… are you serious? “Dude.” I run a hand through my hair. “You’re telling me you- the orthodontists there pulled out a needle, shot it in your mouth and you never once asked ‘huh, I wonder what that’s for?’” I can’t believe this.</p><p>He doesn’t say anything. I’m almost at a loss for words, myself. Jeez, I get he’s a half demon, but thinking about having people fiddle with my teeth like that without being numbed is… well, it’s a painful thought.</p><p>No wonder he feels so shitty.</p><p>And it’s not like me complaining is making him feel any better. I can’t help but feel bad for him. I mean sure, he’s tough as nails, but that’s just… jeez.</p><p>I opt to sit back down next to him. “Sorry for giving you a hard time, man.” There was no way for him to know, really. It’s unfair for me to get on his ass for that.</p><p>“You don’t need to apologize,” he says without having to think about it. “You’re not exactly wrong, per s-sh-e.”</p><p>“Yeah, but I don’t wanna bother ya if you’re already feeling shitty.” Even if it isn’t as painful for him as it would be for a normal human, it’s still gotta suck. “Y’know what? You can keep watching your weird movies. I won’t bother you.”</p><p>“I don’t mind being ‘bothered,’” he says while turning back to the screen. He keeps trying to pick as the empty carton to no avail. Hm. Well I guess if medicine won’t help him, at least ice cream will. I’ll have to grab more tomorrow.</p><p>“And they’re not weird.”</p><p>I snort. “Whatever helps ya sleep at night.”</p><p>…</p><p>Later that night, it’s finally time to get some shut-eye.</p><p>Last time Vergil stayed the night, I let him take my bed while I took the couch. But now that we’re, uh… whatever we are now, that shouldn’t be too much of an issue. Without much fanfare, we both decided that sharing the bed couldn’t be so bad. What’s the worst that could happen?</p><p>Well I’ll tell you the worst: Vergil’s got a nasty case of the blanket hog.</p><p>Every single time I’ve got a good portion of the blanket, he slowly starts rolling it back to his side. He’s already fast asleep, so I have to keep yanking it back whenever he steals it. And believe me, it’s hard- trying to pry something out of a demonic grip is damn near impossible, even if they’re sleeping.</p><p>At least he didn’t tuck in Yamato. I woulda kicked him out to the couch if he tried.</p><p>Eventually it gets so bad that the blanket’s only covering half of my leg. Now really, this is an easy fix- I could just walk into the front room right now and grab the blanket off the side of the couch. But I really don’t feel like getting up right now. My laziness will be my downfall.</p><p>“Dude,” I say while shaking the back of his shoulder a little. He makes a sort of sleepy humming noise, but he’s awake. “Vergil. Quit being a blanket hog.”</p><p>He looks slightly over his shoulder before shoving his head back into his pillow. “I’m not hogging the blanket.”</p><p>“Bullshit.” I get that he’s tired and all, but he doesn’t have to be such an ass. “Stop hogging it and hand it over.”</p><p>“Just grab the one from your living room if you’re that conc-sh-erned.”</p><p>The audacity of this guy. “You get it, since you wanna keep that one to yourself.”</p><p>He groans and a blue light starts glowing from the hallway. After a few seconds, the glow gets closer to the room. Then Doppel’s standing in my doorway, blanket in claws. It walks up to me and plops the blanket down on me. It gives my head a little pat before vanishing again.</p><p>“There. Now let me s-sh-leep.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” I say while rolling over. “Goodnight to you too, asshole.”</p><p>…</p><p>On day three of his stay, we decide to crack out some board games.</p><p>In between me going to work and running some general errands, him and I just kinda chill around my house and do nothing all day. It’ll be a nice change of pace to do something fun.</p><p>And don’t get me wrong, it actually is pretty fun. Trying to steal Vergil’s money while playing Monopoly coupled with the absolute shenanigans we get into trying to come up with made up words for Scrabble make for a pretty entertaining afternoon.</p><p>There’s only one problem with that.</p><p>Playing board games with only one other person is, well, kinda boring. Sure, bringing out Doppel certainly spices up a few games, but it couldn’t hurt to have a few more players.</p><p>And then, like clockwork, I get a stupid idea.</p><p>“Hey, Vergil.”</p><p>“Oh no.”</p><p>I quirk an eyebrow at that. “What do you mean ‘oh no?’”</p><p>“It means that I can tell you have an idea,” he chuckles out. “I have every right to be concerned.”</p><p>Ah, he knows me too well. “Well, Vergil. I was just thinking about how it’s just the two of us here.” He’s gonna think I’m crazy for this one. “What say we add a few more faces to the party? Like, oh I don’t know, maybe a bird and a panther-”</p><p>“You can’t be serious-”</p><p>“C’mon, dude, it’ll be funny-”</p><p>“You’re insane-”</p><p>“Oh c’mon, Vergil.” I’m practically whining at this point, but I don’t care. “It’ll make the game more interesting. And it’s been forever since you’ve done it, dude. I’m curious.” I tack on a small little ‘please?’ at the end to try and convince him.</p><p>He just rolls his eyes and pulls out Yamato. “I despise you,” is all he says before shoving the blade through his midsection.</p><p>Then out pops V and his little entourage.</p><p>Before I can greet him, Griffon shuffles over to me and leans on my arm. “It’s been so long, doll!”</p><p>“Nice to see you too, Griffon.” Then I motion to the board. “Alright, I know you guys don’t have much time, so I’ll make this quick- everyone gets a piece. Just roll the dice and try to get your guy to the other side of the board. Cool? Cool.”</p><p>V leans forward from where he’s sitting with a smirk. “Then there’s no time to waste.”</p><p>And then the game proper starts.</p><p>I realize pretty early on that V is out for blood with this one. It quickly becomes a psychological game of chess between us to see who’ll come out on top. Well y’know what? He’s gonna have to pry the victory from my cold dead hands.</p><p>In between our turns, we have to make accommodations for his little boy band. It’s pretty hard to play board games without opposable thumbs, go figure. Griffon winds up rolling the dice with his claws, then pecking his little piece around with his beak. We have to move our game to the floor so that Shadow can paw the dice around. V helps her move the pieces cause, like I said, no opposable thumbs. I even crack open a window in the kitchen so Nightmare can play from my backyard. I have no idea how it sees the board from here, but I don’t think I wanna know.</p><p>“So, V,” I start taunting him when it gets to his turn. “Whatcha gonna do? You roll one wrong number, and you’ll have to move back to the beginning.” Okay that’s an exaggeration- he’ll only have to move back around twenty spaces- but I’ve gotta psych him out somehow.</p><p>But he doesn’t cave. “'Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence.'”</p><p>“... dude chill, it’s just a board game…” Of course he’s gotta overdramatize the whole thing.</p><p>Then he rolls.</p><p>“Hah!” He winded up landing on the square I warned him about. He loses a few minutes’ worth of progress.</p><p>While he sits there and broods, I decide to keep messing with him. “It’s a shame, really. You were so close to winning.” I roll without thinking about it. “I couldn’t imagine how that must-”</p><p>I end up landing on that exact square.</p><p>As I dejectedly move my piece back, V does a little half smirk. “‘Couldn’t imagine how that must feel,’ hm?”</p><p>“Whatever,” I cut him off before he can keep it up. Welp, looks like we’re both gonna lose.</p><p>After a few minutes, against everyone’s better judgement, Nightmare comes out victorious. It’s kinda hard to read the emotions on that thing, but its eye is squinting a little upwards right now. It must be a little happy, at least.</p><p>“Congrats, ya big lug!” Griffon flies out the window and gives Nightmare what I can only assume is a high five. “I knew ye had it in ya!”</p><p>With the game said and done, V finally starts flaking away. “Ah,” is all he says while looking at his hand. “I’m afraid our time here has expired.”</p><p>“Hm.” Well, that sucks. I don’t get to see V all that often, so I’m a little disappointed. Seeing Vergil’s dorky human side accentuated like this is always a treat.</p><p>Griffon flies back through the window and returns to V. “Catch ye on the flip side, baby!”</p><p>I pat Griffon and Shadow on the head a couple times. “See ya later.”</p><p>And just like that, they disappear.</p><p>Vergil sits in front of me looking a little tired. Huh, he must’ve really pushed himself to keep V out for that long. Even though he’s so spent, though, he still manages to throw some snark in. “That counts as a win for me.”</p><p>“Shut up, Vergil.”</p><p>…</p><p>About a week into his stay here, he starts cleaning the place up.</p><p>It’s not like I asked him to or anything. I just come home from work one day and find everything weirdly organized. When I ask Vergil about it, he says that he was just bored and wanted to neaten things up. I mean fair enough, I guess, but he really didn’t have to do that.</p><p>And that’s not it- he did all the laundry, too. And washed the dishes, and swept and vacuumed- jeez, he must've been really bored.</p><p>“Y’know what, Vergil,” I say while he watches another one of his old movies. He makes a little hum noise in acknowledgement, so I continue. “Why don’t we get you a library card or something? I get the feeling you’d like it there.”</p><p>He takes a second to think about it before responding. “I never really considered that.”</p><p>Really? I figured Vergil would spend a ton of free time in the library. “Well I think you’d like it. And it’s pretty easy to get one. All you need to do is, like, show them your license or something.”</p><p>He nods. “They won’t notice it’s fake, will it?”</p><p>“No, they shouldn’t no-” wait. Did I hear that right?</p><p>Staring him down is the only thing I can do to confirm it. Vergil doesn’t look all too bothered by what he just said. So does he really-</p><p>“You have a fake license?” Of all the stupid things Vergil’s done… “Dude.”</p><p>He just shrugs at that. “All of my documentation is forged.” The fact that he can say that with a straight face is baffling.</p><p>“How can you be so casual about that?” Leave it to Vergil to throw me for another loop like this.</p><p>“In my defense,” he starts, “a mysterious man appearing into the city with no records on him for at least the past forty years is rather suspicious.”</p><p>“I… you make a good point.” It would be pretty hard to get any actual certifications, huh? Well whatever, that’s beside the point. “In any case, you should get a library card. They’ve got all that nerdy shit you like.”</p><p>He rolls his eyes. “It’s not as ‘dorky’ as you make it out to be.”</p><p>“Oh really? ‘It’s-sh not as-sh dorky as-sh you make it out to be-’”</p><p>“The lisp went away days ago. Your mockery isn’t even accurate, at this point-”</p><p>“‘The lis-sh-p went away days-sh ago! Your mockery is-sh-n’t even accurate-’”</p><p>“Whatever.” He finally turns back to the screen. I elbow him on the arm while snickering. Ah, messing with him is so fun.</p><p>I could get used to this.</p><p>…</p><p>Around two weeks into his stay, I finally drag him outta the house for a bit.</p><p>It’s not for anything special, really- we’re just grabbing the groceries. But being holed up in that house all month isn’t gonna do him any good. I don’t want him to get vitamin deficient or something.</p><p>So we have a largely uninteresting trip through the store. I get a lot of soft foods for him- y’know, mashed potatoes, apple sauce, soup, stuff like that- so it doesn’t get stuck in his braces. I also grab him more chocolate ice cream. Medicine doesn’t help him, but ice cream sure as hell does. Overall, it’s pretty uneventful.</p><p>Until I see Dante walk into the next aisle.</p><p>Oh, shit. I elbow Vergil in the ribs to get his attention. Once he sees what’s going on, he ends up teleporting into the aisle behind us. Dante notices me, though, and decides to stroll up and chat. Oh, boy.</p><p>“Ey, there. You’re Vergil’s friend, yeah?”</p><p>“That would be me, yes.” Alright, focus. All I’ve gotta do is get Dante to go away. Shouldn’t be too hard, right?</p><p>He makes a passing glance at the cart and quirks a brow. “You must really like ramen, huh?”</p><p>“What can I say?” Okay, this isn’t just for Vergil- I regularly buy a shit ton of ramen. “It’s cheap and gets the job done.”</p><p>He shrugs. “Can’t argue with that.”</p><p>We both chuckle for a few seconds. Alright, this is going pretty smoothly. If I play it right, I should be able to make my retreat.</p><p>Right as I’m about to tell him to have a good one, though, he beats me to the punch. “I’m sure you’re pretty busy right now, but I’ve got one more question for ya.”</p><p>I lean on the cart. “Alright, shoot.”</p><p>“Y’wanna tell my brother he can stop hiding in the toilet paper aisle?”</p><p>Oh. Well, shit. Dante’s a lot more perceptive than he lets on.</p><p>Without saying anything, Vergil walks back into the aisle. He doesn’t say anything, of course, because Dante still doesn’t know he has braces. Well probably, at least.</p><p>“Ah, brother.” Dante lets out a little chuckle. “You really thought I’d buy the whole ‘important mission’ bit?”</p><p>I scratch the back of my head. “I thought it sounded pretty convincing at the time…”</p><p>Dante lets out a little tsk sound and smiles. “But hey, I’m not mad or anything. I won’t rag on ya for hangin’ out with a friend.” Dante goes right up to Vergil and elbows him a couple times in the chest while winking. “Just don’t get any ideas.”</p><p>Vergil shoves him off and rolls his eyes. Dante just throws his hands up sarcastically and cackles to himself. Then he strolls back out right from where he came. “See ya in a couple weeks, bro!”</p><p>Once he goes a couple aisles down, Vergil and I both let out a sigh we were holding in. That was a close one.</p><p>At least he doesn’t know about the braces.</p><p>…</p><p>Around three weeks into his stay, I ask him something.</p><p>We’re both just watching some random action flick- something I chose, for once- which neither of us are fully paying attention to.</p><p>Eventually, a random question pops in my head. “Ey, Vergil.”</p><p>“Hm?”</p><p>“Y’ever thought about moving outta your brother’s place?”</p><p>“That’s an oddly specific question.” He looks up from the movie. “Why do you ask?”</p><p>“I dunno.” I just shrug and look back to the TV. “It just popped in my mind, so I thought I'd ask.”</p><p>“Hm.” It takes him a few seconds to respond. “I can’t say I’ve thought about it, no.”</p><p>“Hm.”</p><p>And that’s about it, really.</p><p>…</p><p>Finally, it’s been a month. Vergil seems particularly excited to get this over with.</p><p>I already brought him to the orthodontist. I’m in the waiting room right now, actually. That same old dude that was checking out dentures last time is still here, weirdly enough. Aside from that, though, nothing’s outta the ordinary.</p><p>It shouldn't take him that long to get his braces taken off. Considering how much trouble he accidentally gave them last time, I’m assuming they’re gonna try to get it done as soon as possible. They prolly never wanna see him in here again.</p><p>Hopefully, he’ll never have to be here after this. I’ll just have to make sure he takes care of his teeth.</p><p>After around forty minutes, Vergil comes right back out from the door in the back. I already did all his paperwork beforehand, so he’s not gonna have to worry about it.</p><p>Now, for the interesting part.</p><p>Once he gets right in front of me, I stand there and wait. It looks like he wants to go. Honestly, though, I wanna see how it looks. “Well?”</p><p>“Well what?”</p><p>“Show me your teeth, dude.”</p><p>Vergil just rolls his eyes again and raises the top of his lip. I can’t see all his teeth, but they look a whole lot better than they did before. Perfect.</p><p>“Looks good, dude. I almost don’t recognize you,” I say, only half sarcastically. He really does look a lot better, though.</p><p>He just sighs and shakes his head a little. But whether he means to or not, he’s got an almost missable smile painted on his face.</p><p>With all that said and done, it’s finally time to take him back to his place. He didn’t really take much with him, so we don’t need to make a trip back to my place.</p><p>On the ride there, he starts moving his jaw around and rubbing his chin. “This will take some time to get used to.”</p><p>“I can imagine.” Having wires sticking outta your mouth for a month would be pretty hard to get used to; I’d figure the same would go in reverse. “Y’think Dante’ll notice?”</p><p>“I doubt it.” Yeah, he’s probably right. Dante’s pretty perceptive, but I don’t think he’d give a damn about his teeth. Well that or he won’t care. Either way, it shouldn’t be an issue.</p><p>Once we park near the front door stairs, I auto unlock the door for him. “Welp, it’s been fun. Really.”</p><p>“It has,” he agrees. He steps outta the car and turns to the door. “I appreciate you letting me stay for so long.”</p><p>“It’s no biggie.” I salute to him before he shuts the door. “I’ll see ya around, Vergil.”</p><p>He throws me a smile before shutting the door. “Until then.”</p><p>I start up the car again once he goes through the front doors, and that’s that.</p><p>What an interesting week, that’s been. I’m honestly looking forward to playing more board games with V and his summons. Though next time he stays over, I hope he doesn’t say something weird again. Then again, what could be worse than the whole ‘forging legal documents’ thing? Actually, no, I’m not gonna jinx it. Even so, I can’t say I had a bad time.</p><p>I’m gonna need more ice cream next time, though.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And yeah, that's the chapter. I don't remember who it was that asked for more V, but I hope you found this funny. ;] Anyway that's enough from me, see ya next time.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0031"><h2>31. Let's Go Larping</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Jousting looks pretty fun.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Howdy, gamers. I've got another chapter for you guys. I had a shit eating grin while writing a specific part, which I think you guys will probably notice pretty soon.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>I can’t wait for five-thirty to roll around.</p><p>So as it turns out, every few years, this traveling renaissance fair winds up in Red Grave. It’s a pretty big one, by the sounds of it- it runs for a few blocks. Apparently there were so many people one year, traffic was behind for a couple hours.</p><p>And y’know what? It sounds fun. Aside from the biweekly demon attacks, there isn’t really much going on in Red Grave. Going to a ren fair would shake things up for a bit.</p><p>Now of course, going there alone would be pretty boring. That’s why I asked Vergil to come with me. I figure he’s never been to a medieval cosplay convention, right? It’ll be fun for both of us.</p><p>And I made sure to tell him to make his own costume. It just won’t be the same without a silly little outfit, y’know? Plus he said Dante’ll be out on a mission until the end of July, so he’s got plenty of time.</p><p>In any case, it’s almost time for the con to start. He should be here any second-</p><p>And just then, the doorbell rings. Oh boy, this is bound to be good.</p><p>“Come in.” I kept the door unlocked since I figured he’d be here eventually. Maybe I shoulda just told him to teleport inside or something. Oh, well.</p><p>With no further notice needed, he walks in and shuts the door behind him. Huh. It looks like he’s going for one of those medieval warrior looks. He’s got what I’m assuming is supposed to be a tunic with these really big adventurer pants under it. Wow, he put a lot more effort into the fit than I thought he would. He’s even got his hair pulled back and everything.</p><p>“Not bad.” He looks really cool, actually. And wow, that’s a shit ton of belts he’s got on. “I was expecting you to go as a knight or something.”</p><p>For some reason, he all but physically cringes at that. Okay, I guess he’s got some beef with knights. Duly noted.</p><p>Then he looks at my fit and quirks a brow. “What are you supposed to be, exactly?”</p><p>“Isn’t it obvious?” Yeesh, you’d think he woulda gotten it from the giant hat I’ve got on. “I’m a royal priest.”</p><p>He doesn’t look any more impressed. “Did you ever pay attention in your history classes?”</p><p>The nerve of this guy… “Tough talk comin’ from someone who never even went to school.” He probably got all his history lessons from some hundred-something year old books, anyway. “Who even cares about the historical accuracy? I just think it looks cool,” I say while overdramatically flipping a part of the robe.</p><p>He just shakes his head and moves toward the door. “In any case, we should be going-”</p><p>“Wait, wait, wait-” I interrupt him. “I’ve got something for ya.”</p><p>While I start rifling through some stuff in my front room, he chuckles to himself. “Should I be concerned?”</p><p>“Nah, it’ll be cool. Trust me.” Alright, where did I put it? It can’t be too far off- I just made it a few days ago. Maybe I shoulda put it somewhere more convenient.</p><p>After about a half a minute of me dismantling my living room, I finally find what I’m looking for. “Think fast,” I say while tossing it to him.</p><p>Once again, he catches what I throw at him without looking at it. When he looks down at the hilt in his hands, he looks back up confused. “I already have a sword.”</p><p>“You have a katana,” I correct him. “And- contrary to popular belief- katanas weren’t all that common in medieval Europe.”</p><p>He doesn’t have an argument for that one. Unfortunately, though, he isn’t wearing a trenchcoat. I don’t know where he’s planning on hiding that thing.</p><p>Before I can offer to hide it in my outfit, though, he smirks and looks up at me. “Do you want to see a magic trick?” And just like everything he says, that’s awfully cryptic.</p><p>Before I can ask what he means by that, though, he transforms Yamato into a demonic looking forearm. What… okay, that’s gotta be one of his most weirdly specific abilities. Well out of everything he’s shown me, at least. Just what else could he possibly be hiding?</p><p>While he sticks the arm into his traveler’s satchel, I shake my head. “Where’d ya learn that one?”</p><p>He opens the door with his free hand and keeps up the smirk. “A magician never reveals his secrets.”</p><p>I snort. “Dork.” And just like that, his cool guy facade drops. Ah, there he is- classic awkward Vergil. I was starting to miss him, for a second there.</p><p>When I start walking down the sidewalk, he motions over to my car. “We’re going on foot?”</p><p>“The fair always backs up traffic, apparently. I don’t wanna get stuck on the side of the road for an hour.” He shrugs and catches up to me. “Plus it’s just a couple blocks away. Walking there wouldn’t be the end of the world or anything.”</p><p>He makes a little ‘hm’ noise to himself. “Not that I particularly care, but are you not concerned that your neighbors may see you dressed like that?”</p><p>“Meh. Most of Red Grave’s gotta know about the ren fair by now, anyway.” Then I elbow him in the arm. “And it’s not like your trench coat makes you look any less ridiculous.”</p><p>He doesn’t look very happy, at that.</p><p>I cackle while he scowls to himself. “It’s a joke! It’s a joke. Don’t be like that.” I reach up and poke his cheek. “C’mon, buddy. Show me those pearly whites.”</p><p>He swats my hand away and gives me a weird look. “Who are you, my mother?”</p><p>We keep on laughing and talking for the next few minutes. Man, he seems a lot more relaxed than usual. Maybe he’s just happy to have the shop to himself, for a while.</p><p>Well it’s nice, in any case.</p><p>…</p><p>After around ten minutes, we make it to the fair. We’re able to hear it from around the block before we even make it there- it sounds like a lot of people showed up. That’s not all that surprising, really.</p><p>Walking up to the entrance greets us with a bright gold sign with the words ‘Renaissance Festival’ in an almost indecipherable font. Beyond that, we can see a lot of the fair’s attraction from over here. There’s some sort of Shakespearean play going on to our right, a pig and hog pen to the left, and-</p><p>“Woah, they’ve got jousting matches?” I didn’t really read up much on the fair before coming here, so this is news to me. But holy shit, that’s so cool! “Let’s go check it out.”</p><p>Vergil just shrugs and lets me lead the way. Considering he’s a born warrior, he’s probably seen his fair share of jousting matches. This probably won’t impress him much.</p><p>But y’know what? This is the type of stuff I live for. It’s not everyday I get to see an authentic jousting match in a mini colosseum.</p><p>Now of course, there’s the problem of finding a good place to sit. We have to keep shuffling around crowds of people to try and find a good spot. Jeez, this place is really packed. Maybe they shoulda put more seats in here or something.</p><p>Just when we’re about to round another corner, a guy in a full jester get-up stops us in our tracks. “Halt, citizens!”</p><p>Oh boy, this must be security. We’ve seen a few guards come in and make people leave. Like I said, it’s pretty crowded in here. “You may not cross this path any longer. You shall be escorted from the stadium and back into the convention proper, henceforth.”</p><p>“... alright, cool.” It’s kinda weird that the security guys gotta be in character. I wonder if it’s in their contract or something.</p><p>Welp, the jousting match was a bust. That sucks. Vergil mumbles something to himself while we leave the match. “I always hated jesters…”</p><p>“Tell me about it.” It’s one thing to get kicked out by a guard. But getting kicked out by a clown? That stings way worse.</p><p>That feeling only sticks for a few seconds, though, cause there’s a food vendor not too far from us. I reach into the hidden pockets on the robe and pull out a twenty. “Wanna get us something to eat?”</p><p>He nods his head and grabs the bill. I sit on a wooden bench a couple feet away. “Grab me a cobbler,” I shout while he walks. He just waves his hand a couple times behind him in acknowledgement. Douche.</p><p>Uhg, I get that this is a medieval fair and all that, but they coulda shaved the benches a little more. These are so splintery, jeez.</p><p>Someone sits down next to me on the other side of the bench. Wow, this dude’s got really shiny armor.</p><p>“Sick costume, man.” Most of the knights here aren’t nearly as authentic looking as this. I think it’s real metal, actually. It must’ve been expensive. “Didja make it yourself?”</p><p>The guy just stares back at me blankly. Okay, not much of a talker. It’s then that they hold up their sword. It’s so polished. Seriously, it almost looks real-</p><p>Before I can say anything else, they wind up slicing the bench clean in half.</p><p>Oh. It’s a demon.</p><p>And just like that, the entire con starts freaking out. From where I’m sitting, I can see a ton of other knights with the same armor going around and terrorizing people. So this was a coordinated attack, then? Weird.</p><p>Then the knight turns to look at me again. Alright, this is a problem.</p><p>The guy keeps trying to lob my head off while I messily dodge its sword. This would be a lot less of an issue if I wasn’t stuck on the bench. It’s not really leaving me with any escape routes right now, though, so I’m a sitting duck for now.</p><p>Through the hysteria around me, I hear a particular set of footsteps running up. I take it the demon hears it too, because it turns around to see Vergil barreling towards us. He steps right up to it, holds up his sword, and smacks it straight in the head.</p><p>The sword, of course, completely shatters on impact.</p><p>We all pause to comprehend what just happened. Vergil looks down at his hand, completely dumbfounded. Even the demon pauses to look down at the sword. Yeah, maybe making it outta styrofoam was a bad idea.</p><p>With a sigh, Vergil reaches into his satchel and grabs the demon arm. As soon as it turns into Yamato, he impales the demon right between the plates of its armor, killing it instantly.</p><p>Throwing the corpse on the floor, Vergil extends a hand out to me. “I trust you’re doing well?”</p><p>“Never better, buddy,” I say while he pulls me to my feet. Before the demon can disintegrate, though, I reach down and pick up its sword. I know it’s demonic and all that, but it’s a real broadsword. It’s a little heavy, but that’s par for the course for high quality swords like this. “I’m keeping this.”</p><p>The sounds of people panicking gets his attention again. He shifts his focus to the knights in the distance and fixes his stance. “Let me do the fighting. We wouldn’t want to dirty the blade, would we?”</p><p>“You read my mind.” I stand a little behind him, fully prepared to let him do all the work. “Lead the way, dude.”</p><p>And just like that, Vergil starts clearing house with every demon in sight. I follow a fair distance behind him cause, y’know, he’s a nearly invincible demon man and I’m not. You’d be surprised how many times his invincibility has come in handy, really.</p><p>Eventually, though, he gets into a little bit of a pickle when he’s fighting four demons head on. He kills all of them pretty easily, but one guy comes up and tries to throw in a potshot from behind.</p><p>I wind up panicking and shakily stabbing it before its sword can make contact. Vergil turns around just as it falls on the ground. I look up at him, completely bug eyed, before he gives me a smirk. Hah… hahah. I guess I saved his bacon there, huh? Okay, realistically it wouldn’t have hurt him that badly. But it feels good to help him out like this.</p><p>I never wanna do that again, though.</p><p>After a few more rounds of demons, it looks like he’s picked off everything here. Everyone else evacuated a while ago, so it’s just us here now. Bummer. Maybe the owners woulda given us some free cobbler or something.</p><p>So we decide to take our leave. “Are you enjoying your shiny new toy?”</p><p>I lift the sword up to my shoulder and shift it around a little. “You could say that.” I wonder if I should give it a name. If Vergil can have cool names for all his weapons, I don’t see why I can’t. “This puppy’s gonna make for some fine wall decor.”</p><p>Vergil lets out an exasperated sigh. “Wall decor?”</p><p>“You actually think I’m gonna learn to use a sword?” I shake my head. “I’d rather leave the fighting up to you. I prefer my spine to remain intact, thank you very much.”</p><p>Vergil chuckles. “You’re so sure? There are plenty of skilled humans who hunt demons for a living.”</p><p>“Now you want me to be a demon hunter? Honestly, who do you take me for?”</p><p>And just like before, we wind up laughing and talking back to my place. Y’know, the whole renaissance fair might’ve been a bust, but I still had a blast today. I’m sure Vergil had a bit of fun, too. He always seems a little happier when he gets to flex Yamato.</p><p>That being said, I hope I never have to pick up a sword again.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And there's the chapter. Yeah, I started cackling at the whole Yamato-Devil Bringer bit. I wonder if the original owner of that arm will ever appear... eh, probably not. Anyway, see ya around.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0032"><h2>32. Possession and Why it Sucks</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Featuring Nero from the Devil May Cry Series.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. Sorry for posting this at an unholy time, again- I usually write these really late, haha. But yeah, here's a chapter! It's kinda a long one.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Good morning, Red Grave.</p><p>Ah, how I love waking up with nothing to do. Not only is it Saturday, but the store is closed tomorrow for an annual safety inspection. That means I don’t gotta work again until Tuesday- Hell, I don’t even gotta leave the house ‘till then.</p><p>I crack open a window to let some air in. No work, no errands I gotta run, and amazing weather to boot? This is the life. I can already tell this is gonna be a good weekend.</p><p>… hey, is that a dead body?</p><p>Yeah, so I’m pretty sure there’s a corpse sitting on the side of the road. Leave it to Red Grave to drop someone’s remains right on the curb. Well either that, or someone dropped their trench coat in the street. I can’t see it that well from over here, but I doubt someone would just… leave that there…</p><p>… wait.</p><p>Oh, shit. I start speed walking to the door on instinct. That better not be who I think it is.</p><p>The dread sitting in the bottom of my stomach isn’t helped when I make it outside. Whoever it is just so happens to be pretty far up the road, so I won’t be able to recognize it until I get a little closer.</p><p>From a distance, I notice a tuft of white hair sticking up from the collar. Oh, shit. So… it really is-</p><p>“Holy shit, Vergil!”</p><p>I start sprinting up the road to where his possibly dead body is. Finding Vergil’s carcass on the ground would be a horrible start to my weekend. I don’t even know if he can die, though. I’ve only even seen him bleed once in the four years I’ve known him- he’s practically unkillable.</p><p>He’d better be, at least.</p><p>I slide on my knees when I get to him. Okay, okay, don’t panic- first thing’s first, gotta check if he’s alive. Yeah, that’s important.</p><p>It doesn’t take me very long to find out that he’s still breathing. Oh, thank God. Or should I think Sparda? Well whoever’s watching over him right now, I’m thankful for them.</p><p>Alright, that leaves me with my second problem: what do I do now?</p><p>Okay, think. What would Vergil do if our positions were switched?... actually, no. He wasn’t really much help when I got knocked out by that dumpster. And if whatever got him like this is still around, I really don’t wanna-</p><p>Actually, what knocked him out again? Doing a onceover of him doesn’t really give me many hints. There’s no stab wounds, cuts or bruises- nothing. Maybe that’s just cause he’s laying on his stomach, though. I’ll have to flip him over to check.</p><p>Before that, though, I should probably call someone. There’s no way I’m gonna be able to drag him all the way back to my place, but I don’t just wanna leave him lying out here.</p><p>I could call the police too but, well, this is Vergil we’re talking about. He’d never want someone outside of his circle to see him like this. Guess that just leaves the shop, then.</p><p>I pull out my phone and start dialing the shop number. Vergil said Dante’d be out until the end of the month, didn’t he? Hopefully someone else is there, then. I’m kinda screwed if no one picks up.</p><p>Regardless, I press call.</p><p>Vergil’s only mentioned a few people ever being in the shop at any given time. With Dante out, that just leaves Trish, Lady and some guy named Morrison. But Lady isn’t exactly a business partner, to my knowledge, and Morrison’s just some normal guy. I’ve gotta hope Trish is there, then, but the chances of that are-</p><p>Someone picks up on the third ring. “Devil May Cry.”</p><p>Huh. That’s a new voice. “Hey, there. Who is this?”</p><p>“Name’s Nero,” the guy says. Wait, that’s Vergil’s kid. “I usually run the Fortuna branch. I’m just here to visit for a bit.” Ah, that makes sense. Guess that explains why Vergil went to visit Fortuna for a month or two last year. “Is there a problem?”</p><p>I don’t want Vergil to be out in the open for too long, so I might as well cut to the chase. “Yeah, I kinda found your coworker passed out on the side of the road.”</p><p>“What?!” Something slams on the other line. I can practically feel the guy’s panic through the phone, jeez. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so blunt.</p><p>After a few seconds, the guy coughs and puts on a serious voice. “Okay. Give me your location, then hit the road. Whatever took him out might still be around, and you don’t wanna deal with that. Trust me.”</p><p>I give him the name of the intersection and describe the surroundings. Before I can tell him that I’m not just gonna leave him here, though, he hangs up. Great.</p><p>Well, I’ve got time. Time to figure out what exactly did him in like this.</p><p>Against way too much of a struggle, I try and flip him on his back. Holy Hell, what’s he been eating? I get that he’s a super human and all that, but I’d never expect him to be this damn heavy.</p><p>Somehow, I manage to flip him over. Uhg, that was annoying. While I pant, I look him over to try and figure out what got him.</p><p>Huh, that’s weird. He doesn’t have any wounds here, either. What is here, though, is some weird looking moss stuff. Only difference is that it’s fizzing… and purple. Yeah, I don’t think moss is supposed to be purple.</p><p>Out of curiosity, I poke it with a stick. The stick, in turn, ends up burning itself in half. Alright, so organic matter shouldn’t touch it. Good to know.</p><p>I decide to pick up the neighbor’s newspaper and use the plastic to flick it off of him. Ew, ew, ew- oh jeez- oh man, that got on his cheek. Ahg, I’m just gonna make things worse.</p><p>Instead of burning through his face, though, the moss stuff slowly seeps into his skin. Huh. Weird.</p><p>With most of the moss now on the road and fizzing away, all I can do is try and wake him up. “Dude?” I nudge his leg with my foot. Nope, nothing.</p><p>“Vergil, I’m gonna steal Yamato! I’m doing it right now!” I pull Yamato out of his hand. Still nothing.</p><p>“Duuuuuuude, wake uuuuuuuuup,” I say while shaking his entire body. Nada.</p><p>Welp, I’m outta ideas. I sit next to him and think. Okay, so that moss stuff probably isn’t from any normal plant. If I had to guess, he was probably fighting something before getting here. There’s no ashes on the ground or anything, so he probably traveled a little bit before falling unconscious. And the lack of wounds has gotta mean the moss knocked him out, right? I’m not really sure how, but that stuff’s gotta have done it.</p><p>Before I can come to any real conclusions, a voice rings out a few feet away from me. “I thought I told you to get outta here.”</p><p>Looking up greets me with a pretty exasperated looking Nero. It looks like he’s trying to be more pissed off, but he’s got this concerned look written all over his face. He’s not as good as hiding his feelings as Vergil, is he?</p><p>“Sorry, man,” I say while standing up and dusting off my pants. “I didn’t wanna leave Vergil alone out here.”</p><p>Nero sighs. “Well, you don’t gotta worry about that any-” he cuts himself off. “Wait. You know him?”</p><p>Oh, yeah. I never got the chance to tell him that. “Yeah. We’re, uh… friends.” I’m still not really sure how to describe our relationship.</p><p>“Huh. So you’re the friend he mentioned.” Nero crouches down to Vergil and hoists his body on his back. “I’m still surprised my old man has any friends, to be honest.”</p><p>“Most people are.”</p><p>We both chuckle lightly before a silence falls over us. After walking for a couple minutes, he asks something. “So, uh…” he hesitates. “He’s never said anything about me, has he?” He sounds hopeful and a little scared at the same time.</p><p>Hm. Vergil’s mentioned him a few times, yeah. I probably shouldn’t tell him too much, though. Him and Nero’ve got a pretty rocky relationship, from what I can gleam. Wouldn’t wanna screw that up further. “He said something about you bitch slapping your uncle, once. Seemed awfully proud of that one.”</p><p>Nero just rolls his eyes. “Of all the stories he coulda picked…”</p><p>“Yeah, he doesn’t talk about you much.” I look up at him. “He’s never said anything bad about you, though. Seems pretty proud of you, that guy.”</p><p>Nero doesn’t turn to face me. From what I can tell, though, he’s doing a really bad job of hiding a smile. Ah, he just wants his dear ‘ol dad's approval, huh?</p><p>Nero relaxes his shoulders and lets himself grin a little. “He talks about you sometimes, too.”</p><p>“Oh?”</p><p>“Yeah,” Nero starts. “He doesn’t say much, either. But every now and then, he tells my kids about some crazy situation you two found yourselves in.” He lets out a weird sigh. “How’d you two end up in a bottomless pit, anyway?”</p><p>I sigh back. “It’s kind of a long story…”</p><p>We spend the next ten to fifteen minutes talking about some weird Vergil stories. Wow, I thought Vergil and I had some weird ones, but Nero’s got me beat with some of these. Apparently they were on a job once when out of the blue, Vergil randomly turned Yamato into the weird demon hand and clawed a demon’s eyes out.</p><p>And that’s not it- this huge demon wolf thing was ripping up a city once and instead of killing it, Vergil just ripped open a portal, dragged it through and closed it. When he eventually came back, completely covered in blood and guts, he told Nero that “the threat has been neutralized,” as if it was the most normal thing in the world.</p><p>If there’s one thing Nero and I can agree on, it’s that his old man is a weirdo.</p><p>Right before I can tell him about the snowball fight incident, we make it back to the shop. Nero pushes the door open with his foot and walks over to the couch. While he lays Vergil down, I make my way over to the cats.</p><p>“Hey there, little dudes.” I pet Broccoli and Knuckles before picking them up and leading them up the stairs. “Sorry to kick you outta your bed, but we need the lobby for a bit.” Knuckles nudges my hand with its face before following Broccoli down the hallway. D’aw, what a couple of cuties.</p><p>“So,” he says from the couch. “Y’got any idea what took him out like this?”</p><p>I walk back down and sit next to him. “I’ve got a couple ideas.” I lean Yamato on the side of the couch next to Vergil. He’s probably gonna look for it when he wakes up. “I found him with this weird purple moss all over himself. Pretty sure that took him out, somehow.”</p><p>“Purple moss?” Nero leans forward, completely stumped. “Huh. Never heard of that.”</p><p>“Yeah, it was weird.” I scratch the back of my head. “I scraped it off him before you showed up. It burnt all the grass and stuff. Didn’t look like it affected him, though-”</p><p>Before I can finish my thought, Vergil sits up. Jeez, took him long enough.</p><p>Nero lets out a sigh of relief. “Took ya long enough, asshole.”</p><p>I’m about to say something too- probably about how he scared us half to death, that prick- until he opens his eyes. Now, that on its own isn’t the problem. We’ve been waiting for him to wake up for so long, afterall. This should be good, right?</p><p>Well it would be, given that his eyes weren’t purple.</p><p>I elbow Nero’s arm. “Uh, dude?” Nero looks back up to see what’s wrong, and his smile turns into complete confusion. Okay, this ain’t good.</p><p>Before I can react, Nero grabs my elbow and jerks me backwards before Vergil can slice our heads clean off.</p><p>Well, shit. He’s possessed.</p><p>At least we finally know what the moss does.</p><p>While my heart jumps like a jack rabbit in my chest, Nero pipes up. “You alright?”</p><p>“Just dandy,” I say while shuddering. “What I’m wondering is if he is. He’s going off the rails, dude.” Vergil practically froths at the mouth as he turns himself into a demon. He stands up from the couch with a posture that I can only describe as animal-like and waits for us to make a move. Yup, he lost it.</p><p>Nero takes a second to think about it before grabbing his sword and shifting his stance. “Last time my friends got possessed, our only option was to beat the shit out of them.” He smirks. “Guess that’s our game plan.”</p><p>“‘Our?!’” I shout while already halfway to the door. “Are you crazy? I’m just some normal-ass human, dude! I ain’t cut out for this-”</p><p>Before I can make it out, a wall of spectral swords blocks the exit. Jeez, possessed Vergil is even more of an asshole, somehow.</p><p>“... welp,” I say to Nero from the other side of the room. “I’m screwed.”</p><p>Nero makes a weird noise before launching himself at Vergil. “I’ll fight him off, then! Just try not to get your head chopped off.”</p><p>“Y’don’t gotta tell me twice!” And just like that, the fight starts up.</p><p>Usually, watching Vergil fight is a blast. Being on the receiving end, though? I’d be scared shitless. Not Nero, though- even through Vergil’s onslaught of attacks, he keeps his ground and fights back. He even turns into his own version of that weird devil form. Guess that must run in the family, huh?</p><p>In any case, I should really find some place to hide. There’s no way I can help Nero with this.</p><p>Right as I’m about to book it to Dante’s desk and hide for my life, though, I’m faced with a problem. A big one.</p><p>A Doppelgänger sized problem.</p><p>Doppel starts stalking up to me, a purple aura completely surrounding it. Uh oh. “Doppel, buddy. How’ve ya been? C’mon, buddy, y’don’t wanna hurt me, right? Let’s just settle down and-”</p><p>I have to duck to avoid getting my head lopped off by its spectral Yamato. “Okay! No settling down, gotcha!”</p><p>With Nero having to deal with Vergil, that leaves me over here to fend off Doppel. Well it’s less ‘fending off’ and more me running around screaming while almost getting gutted in the process. I’ll never understand how Vergil’s able to dodge this much- my lungs are killing me.</p><p>I reach one of the walls with a bunch of weapons stuck to it and, rather than trying my luck with one and fighting Doppel normally, I start chucking them at it. Some funky looking shurikens completely miss and hit the wall behind it. There’s some weird gauntlet things that just graze over it like nothing. This one spear, though, actually hits Doppel. I actually landed a hit!</p><p>Only problem is that Doppel looks twice as pissed. Uh oh.</p><p>So I start running again. At some point, Nero manages to knock Yamato out of Vergil’s hands. Okay, this is my best shot!</p><p>I fumble my way over to Yamato and clumsily pick it up. Right as Doppel hits the ground next to me, I lift the sword. “Sorry, Doppel.”</p><p>Before Doppel can get its version of Yamato outta the floorboards, I ram my own right through its chest. It completely disintegrates in front of me.</p><p>Holy shit, that actually worked.</p><p>With my newly found freedom, I check back in on Nero to see what’s going on. Vergil and him are locked in a stalemate- Vergil just summoned another sword in place of Yamato, go figure. But Nero’s losing his footing. I don’t know how much longer he can keep this up.</p><p>Okay, think. What should I do? Throwing myself into the fight would be a suicide mission, but if I sit here and let Nero lose, we’re both toast. Think. Think!</p><p>Hm… okay, well there is one thing I can do.</p><p>While Vergil and Nero push each others’ swords together, I square up. “Hey, Vergil!” That gets the both of them to stop and look back at me. Alright, here goes nothing.</p><p>I shift Yamato over to one hand and step back. Then, with as much force as I can possibly muster, I throw it square at Vergil.</p><p>At least, it would have been square at Vergil. He just moves his head slightly to the left and Yamato misses by a longshot.</p><p>Welp, it was worth a shot.</p><p>The room goes dead silent as we all think about what just happened. Even in his possessed state, Vergil can’t help but look at me with the most bewilderment humanly possible. Okay, maybe that was a dumber idea than I thought.</p><p>In his distracted state, though, Nero manages to grab the back of his head with his spectral arms and smack his face into the floor. Then, for the second time today, Vergil’s out like a light.</p><p>“... alright. Good teamwork, Nero.”</p><p>“'Teamwork.' Right...”</p><p>…</p><p>With all that said and done, we end up taping Vergil to the couch. We only barely won that, after all- who knows what’ll happen if he wakes up and tries to kill us again. I still decide to stick around, though, if for no other reason than to help Nero tidy the place up. Who knew that swinging around six foot tall swords for so long would make things so messy? And me throwing all their weapons all over the floor didn’t help, either.</p><p>While picking up some of the broken floorboards, Vergil makes a noise. I call Nero over since, y’know, I can’t fight my way outta a paper bag. With both of us standing over him, Vergil finally opens his eyes.</p><p>He blinks a few times and takes in his surroundings. He looks- with his normal colored eyes, by the way- from the two of us, then down at the duct tape sticking him to the couch, then back at us. “There’d better be a good explanation for this.”</p><p>Nero and I both sigh of relief. Okay, he’s back to normal.</p><p>“Sorry, old man,” Nero says while cutting him loose. “Y’put us in a little bit of a pickle, back there.”</p><p>“That’s the understatement of the century,” I chime in. “Y’nearly diced us into pieces. Well okay, Nero probably woulda been fine, but you almost turned me into minced meat.” I cross my arms and shake my head. “Mind telling us what that was all about?”</p><p>While Vergil sits up and rolls his shoulders, he fills us in. “A powerful demon was making its way through the alleyways. I tracked it down, but was covered with its saliva. It didn’t have an effect at the time, so I didn’t think much of it.”</p><p>“The moss!” So it was saliva this whole time. “I called it. It totally screwed with your brain for a minute there, man.”</p><p>He looks down at his hands and grunts. “I hate being possessed…”</p><p>"Let's just be glad you're back to normal, capiche?" We all stand there for a few seconds without saying anything. Before an uncomfortable silence can fall over us, I go up to Nero and pat him on the back. “My ass woulda been grass if it wasn’t for this guy.”</p><p>Nero scratches the back of his head, a little embarrassed, and lets out a shaky chuckle. “Just doin’ my job…”</p><p>From the couch, Vergil looks up at his son. Though he doesn’t say anything, he smiles softly and looks at his kid with… pride? I think it’s pride. Well whatever it is, it causes Nero to chuckle to himself again. Ah, the father-son bonding going on right now is enough to warm my heart.</p><p>The moment is interrupted, though, when I get all but tackled to the floor by Doppelgänger.</p><p>While I try to sit up, its spectral arms nearly start choking me in the hug we’re stuck in. I know it can’t talk, but I think it’s trying to apologize.</p><p>I’m finally able to sit up and snake my arms around it comfortably. “Aw, Doppel. It’s alright, buddy! I’m okay.”</p><p>While comforting Doppel, I look up at Vergil outta curiosity. He’s got his arms crossed and is looking anywhere but here. Nero, on the other hand, looks kinda confused.</p><p>Y’know what? I feel like messing with him.</p><p>Somehow, I’m able to lean just a little bit away from Doppel. I lean its head down a little and put a little peck on its weird, spiky forehead. It’s just a small thing, really.</p><p>After Doppel gives me an extremely shocked look, it despawns. All that’s left is Vergil, whose face has turned a shade of red I didn’t even know was capable of him. He looks hilarious.</p><p>While I start laughing my ass off from the floor, Nero looks between the two of us with even more confusion than before. “W… what just happened?”</p><p>In the state he’s in, Vergil can’t even get words out. He practically shrinks into his trenchcoat while Nero waits for an answer. I’m pretty sure he’s thinking about teleporting away right now, huh?</p><p>Well, that leaves the answering up to me. And just like earlier, there’s only one thing I can think to say:</p><p>“It’s kind of a long story…”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the chapter. Honestly I get kinda nervous whenever I post chapters that are more serious. Cause I don't want this fic to be this ultra serious, macho momentus story or anything. It's just a silly little story about Vergil being a dumb boomer, haha. But yeah, I hope you guys liked it. Thanks for reading, and see ya next chapter. :]</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0033"><h2>33. Tell Me Something Spooky</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Maybe I should've grabbed a flashlight, after all.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hey, everyone. Sorry for taking so long to post another chapter. I've been swamped with school for a while, haha. But I noticed that the fic got to 10,000 views and I just... how? Thank you all so much, I'm absolutely floored that this reached so many people. But yeah, that's enough of the sappy stuff. Here's a chapter for y'guys.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>‘I have given up cake and my body is a temple!’</p><p>Ah, that’s a classic. Yeah, I recently found out they started airing my favorite childhood show on one of my streaming apps. I was just scrolling through bored, then poof! There it was.</p><p>Now, of course, I could be watching anything else right now- I’ve got a backlog of shows to get through, anyways. But what better way to spend a cold September night on my own than to take a little trip down memory lane?</p><p>Well that, and I don’t have the motivation to watch something new right now.</p><p>Man, I remember this show like it was yesterday. I bet I could still name off a few fun facts about the voice actors if I racked my brain hard enough. Like that character right there? The one dressed in all black? Ah, that’s my favorite character. His voice actor was known for playing-</p><p>That line of thought is quickly cut off when the TV shuts off abruptly. Aw, man, I was just getting to the good bit.</p><p>But that’s not the weird part- when I try and turn it back on, nothing happens. Okay, this is getting weird. Did the remote just stop working?</p><p>I’m about to smack the remote before noticing that the clock on the stove is turned off.</p><p>Oh. Looks like the power’s out.</p><p>By the looks of it, the whole neighborhood’s out with it. All the lights are turned off in my neighbors’ houses. I can barely see a flashlight being waved around a few houses away from me. I’m guessing that messing with the fuse box won’t do any good, then.</p><p>Actually… I wonder. Maybe this goes further than just our neighborhood.</p><p>I grab my phone. Vergil lives a few blocks from here, right? If I call him and it goes straight to voicemail, I’ll know for sure. Yeesh, he should really go get a smartphone at some point.</p><p>Eh, whatever. Let’s give this a go.</p><p>Pressing the caller ID confirms my suspicions. Right after the first ring, it pops over to voicemail. Alright, so either most of Red Grave’s power is down, or this is a really weird coincidence.</p><p>Welp, looks like I better go grab some flashlights. I only have a couple since, y’know, I’m not in desperate need for more flashlights. I know I’ve got at least two in my closet, so I guess I should start there.</p><p>Right as I’m about to round the corner into my hallway, there’s a knock at the door. Really? Who’d wanna visit me right when a blackout hits?</p><p>Actually, no. I know exactly who’d do that.</p><p>“It’s unlocked.”</p><p>The door opens and shuts, and I can faintly hear the lock turn. It’s a little too dark in here to figure out who it is from sight alone, but they don’t stay quiet for long. “Do you ever keep your door locked?”</p><p>Yep- that’s Vergil, alright. “Of course I do. I was just, uh, busy.” Busy forgetting to lock the door, that is.</p><p>Even though I can’t see him, I know he’s rolling his eyes right now. Smug bastard’s so easy to predict.</p><p>“Alright,” I say while feeling around the room. “I was on my way to get some flashlights. That is, y’know, if I can find the hallway.” Okay, that’s a bookshelf, that’s the couch, that’s- “Oh, hey Vergil-” that’s Vergil, that’s- okay, there’s the hallway. Jeez, this is a disaster.</p><p>While I fumble my way across the hallway, a blue light illuminates behind me. Turning around greets me with a very cocky Vergil leaning on the wall, summon sword in hand. Oh, yeah. He can do that.</p><p>That makes my job easier.</p><p>I grab the second summon sword he summons in front of me. “Appreciate the help, Verge.”</p><p>We decide to migrate back over to the couch. Now that we’ve got a light source, navigating’ll be a lot easier. I’ve just gotta hope he doesn’t let it disappear on me.</p><p>“Power’s out for you too, huh?” I start while waving the sword around like a lightsaber. “If it turns out that demons are behind this, I won’t be surprised.”</p><p>“You’d be correct,” he states matter of factly. Yeah, that sounds about right. It seems like nothing can happen in Red Grave without some demonic shenanigans.</p><p>Hey, wait a second. “If you’re so sure it’s caused by demons, what the Hell’re ya doing here? Shouldn’t you be out, like, pounding in demon skulls or something?”</p><p>“I’m not the only demon hunter in Red Grave, you know.” Oh yeah, I guess he’s right. I mean I’ve never seen anyone beat up demons aside from him, so I guess I just kinda assumed… eh, whatever. “Dante is just as capable of cleaning up messes as me… well, not as capable. But capable enough.”</p><p>I snort. “Okay, dork.” Leave it to Vergil to shit talk Dante just cause he has nothing better to do.</p><p>Hm. What time is it? Last time I checked before the power went out, it was around eight-ish. I could go for something to eat.</p><p>I get up to check out the kitchen, hovering the sword just above a few boxes of cereal. “You hungry? We can’t make anything huge right now, but I’ve got snacks.” </p><p>He doesn’t say anything for a few seconds, so I’ll take that as a no. Using the sword to get a little leverage, I manage to scrape a box of cookies over to the edge of the cabinet. Nice.</p><p>I make my way back over to Vergil and dump the box between us. (Hey, he might still want a few even if he’s not hungry.) So, with the light of a few spectral swords over us, we sit here in the dark.</p><p>For a really, really long time.</p><p>Yeah, the sound of me crunching cookies gets really boring after a few minutes. I’m sure he’s probably thought about starting a conversation, but- in classic Vergil fashion- he probably chickened out. Welp, that leaves it up to me to spice things up.</p><p>Luckily, I know just the thing.</p><p>“Alright, Vergil,” I say in an ominous voice to get his attention. Even with it being pretty dark in here, I can still make out his eyes snapping over to me. I’ve got his full attention. Great. </p><p>To make myself look as foreboding as possible, I stick the hilt of the sword under my chin like a flashlight and let it glow. “Y’know what people always do in the dark?”</p><p>He quirks a brow. “Do I want to know?”</p><p>“That’s right: they tell spooky stories.” I do a little spider gesture with my hands to get the point across. “Usually people do this around a campfire, but this’ll have to do.”</p><p>For once, he doesn’t look irritated by the idea. He leans forward and folds his hands over each other. “Horror stories, hm?” He cracks a smirk. “I’m intrigued.”</p><p>Wow. I’m surprised Vergil’s actually going along with this. Usually when I suggest something like this, all I get in return is a shrug and an eye roll. That probably means he’s got something up his sleeve… </p><p>But y’know what? My curiosity is piqued. Whatever Hellish story he’s planning on sharing, I’ll be ready for it.</p><p>“Alright, then,” I call his bluff. “But first, turn off your other swords. I only need one.”</p><p>At that, he extinguishes the rest of his swords. Now the fun can begin.</p><p>“I’ll go first- y’know, since I’m already holding the sword and all.” That, and I’ve already got a story in mind. “This’s one me and my family used to tell each other all the time. Hold onto your socks… cause they might just fall off.”</p><p>Vergil leans forward on the couch as I continue. Perfect.</p><p>“Once,” I begin while waving one of my hands around, “there was a house. And in that house, there was a room. And in that room, there was a closet. And that closet? There was a box.”</p><p>I keep making exaggerated hand movements while telling the story. “And in that box, there was a box. And in that box? Another box. And what was in that box?... go on, give it your best guess.”</p><p>“... another bo-”</p><p>“Another box!” Oh man, this is my favorite part. “The boxes keep on going- box after box, each smaller than the last. Just a box in a box, in a closet, in a room, in a house, in the woods- the house is in the woods, I forgot to mention that earlier.” I can’t stop myself from smiling like an evil maniac when I get to the ending. “But you’ll never guess what was in that final box.”</p><p>Vergil sits there and doesn’t say anything. Alright, time to swoop in with my big finisher. </p><p>“Inside the final box… was a house.”</p><p>With the stinger of the ending finally dropped, I look up at Vergil. He doesn’t say anything for a few seconds, but he’s got the most dumbfounded look on his face. Then, after a stretch of silence, he gives me a small “That was horrible.”</p><p>“I know, right?” I knew this story was pretty dumb since I was a kid, but it’s even more stupid in retrospect. “Ah, it brings back so many memories. The only thing about it that ever really changed was the ending. Sometimes it would be the house, it could be another box, and sometimes it would be- and I quote- ‘something so scary that no mortal could ever hear it.’”</p><p>He just shakes his head. “As humorous as that is, I was expecting something more… well, traditionally scary.”</p><p>“Oh yeah?” I hold out the sword to him and cross my arms. “I don’t see you coming up with anything scarier.”</p><p>At that, he smirks again. This time, though, instead of his usual ‘somewhat-cocky-but-not-malicious’ smirk, it looks a lot more sinister. A lot more… evil…</p><p>Without warning, the sword despawns from my hand and a dozen more surround his back, casting an ominous silhouette of him right in my direction. Oh, shit.</p><p>“Very well,” is all he says before leaning forward again and resting his elbows on his knees. Okay, call me a chicken but I’m already spooked. He hasn’t even started the story yet and I’m already scared shitless.</p><p>“Let me tell you the tale of the man made of fingers.”</p><p>So, for the next few minutes, Vergil goes on- in excessive detail, mind you- about this so-called ‘man made of fingers.’ The story itself is pretty simple- there was an old guy who toyed with things he shouldn’t have, grabbed something he shouldn’t have grabbed, and was cursed to be a creature made of hands and fingers. Pretty basic, all things considered.</p><p>The premise isn’t the scary part, though. It’s the amount of detail Vergil gives it that makes the story so horrific. The amount of body horror, coupled with the psychological fear of losing all the things that make you human, make me close in on myself. The only thing calming me down is the distraction of munching my cookies.</p><p>I don’t show any outward fear, though. I can’t let him win.</p><p>“... some say he still lurks in the shadows alone, waiting for the moment he can creep up and snatch their arms right from their body. Watching. Waiting.”</p><p>“H… hah,” is all I can get out at first. Alright, I won’t lie. I’m a little freaked out. But like I said: I can’t let him win. “That’s the best you’ve got? And that ending, man. That’s gotta be one of the cheesiest ways to close off a campfire story.” I put down the cookies and try to loosen my posture a little. “I mean really, a guy made of fingers? That’s gotta be one of the silliest-”</p><p>Before I can finish my sentence, all the summon swords behind him go dark. The only thing left where they once were are blue particles in the air.</p><p>With those gone, I’m completely in the dark.</p><p>“Oh hardy, har, har. Now you’re just messing with me.”</p><p>There’s no response.</p><p>“Okay seriously, man. Knock it off.” I try to pat down the couch to find him so I can knock some sense into him.</p><p>He’s not here, though.</p><p>“... Vergil?”</p><p>Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Okay, stay calm- he’s probably still messing with me. I’ve just gotta sit here and wait for him to end the charade.</p><p>Just gotta sit here… in pitch darkness… alone… </p><p>The hair on the back of my neck goes up. I’ve never felt my fight or flight defense go off so hard. Jeez, this is silly. I’m getting all worked up over a dumb little horror story-</p><p>A pair of fingers start spidering up my arms.</p><p>The yell that I let out is the loudest noise I’ve made in years. It takes my brain a second to comprehend that it was even me who made the noise. What my brain does comprehend, though, is me falling straight on the floor out of panic.</p><p>Right when my body hits the floor, the room lights up in blue again. The owner of the spider fingers crouches down to meet me, face showered in worry. “That wasn’t supposed to happen- are you-?”</p><p>“You asshole!”</p><p>Before my brain can catch up with me, I lean up and tackle him to the floor. Granted, I’m not mad at him- quite the opposite, actually. It’s getting hard to breathe with how hard I’m laughing. I start fake punching him through the wheezes. “I thought I was gonna die, you prick!”</p><p>Once Vergil realizes I’m not hurt, he starts laughing right along with me. Well, it’s less of a laugh and more of a fit of full blown hysteria. With his back completely pressed to the floor, he puts a hand on his forehead to try and stop his snort cackling. I’ve never seen him laugh this hard in my life.</p><p>“Holy shit, man,” I say in between my own wheezes. “It wasn’t that funny, calm down.”</p><p>That doesn’t stop him in the slightest. Jeez, he can’t even get words out right now. I think I broke him.</p><p>Eventually, it gets to the point where he can’t even keep his swords lit anymore. Then it’s just him and I piled on top of each other, laughing like a couple of maniacs in a pitch black room.</p><p>The world couldn’t get better right now if it tried.</p><p>Right as I think that, the TV flips back on right where it left off. Oh dang, I guess Dante got the power working again. Nice.</p><p>That doesn’t fix the Vergil problem, though.</p><p>With as much force as I can muster, I help Vergil pick himself up off the ground and back onto the couch. He has to wipe a few tears from his eyes, but he’s mostly composed otherwise. I still can’t believe he freaked out so hard.</p><p>After taking a few deep breaths in, he turns to me. “Should I be taking my leave now?”</p><p>“After the shit you pulled today?” I shake my head. “I’m not gonna be able to sleep for a week- let alone by myself- after hearing all that. You’re staying here ‘till tomorrow, at least.”</p><p>He lets out a few more dry chuckles. “Very well.”</p><p>Yeah, I’m gonna be up for the next few hours at least. So help me, if I’m even grazed lightly by someone’s hand for the next month, I’m gonna get chills up my spine. But for some reason, I don’t regret hearing the story. I mean, it came from Vergil for crying out loud. Getting to hear him freak out that hard is a gem I rarely get to see, let alone to that caliber. I wouldn’t trade that for the world.</p><p>I would trade it to keep my hands, though.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's the chapter. I was actually planning on writting a different one this time, but I had the blackout idea and thought it was a lot funnier. So yeah, I'll save my next chapter for next week... well, hopefully next week. I'll have my last essay outta the way by then. But yeah, thanks for reading! Hope you have a good day/night.</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Well that just happened. I can't promise consistent updates, but I'll do my best.</p><p>'Till next time.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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